Hope Still Flies

• He measured in at 12 pounds 8 ounces, and 25 inches today. Still in the 4th percentile for weight, but he's following his own little curve so we're still doing okay.
• Mostly doing size 2 diapers, which he is too scrawny for. But he's too tall for size 1s. Most clothes he's in 3-6/6 months. 0-3 shorts. I put him in a 9 month onesie the other day and it wasn't huge? And the onesie he's wearing in the pictures up there is a 9 month onesie. Very long torsoed. 
• Struggled a little bit with feeding when he was on antibiotics and a little after. Then we had some reflux issues. Finally the past week he's starting to eat better again. 4-5 oz every 3-4 hours. Trying to push it closer to 6 oz so we can take out a feeding or two. He's still eating twice at night, and waking up for the day between five and six. Cue tired mama.
• Still going to bed between 7 and 8. Absolutely no rhyme or reason to his naps yet, and that's okay. Sometimes fewer longer ones, usually lots of shorter ones. Sleeping on his tummy.
• Becoming more attached to his paci.
• Definitely a cuddler. Loves holding onto burp rags or blankets. Cuddles with his paci holders. Also likes to shove all of these things into his mouth.
• Wiggle, wiggle, wiggle. Everywhere. 
• Finally figured out rolling front to back. Hooray!
• Baldie.
• Is great at holding his oballs and other rattles or toys. Not really reaching out far to get stuff, but if it's near or on him he can grab it.
• Hating tummy time a little less, and he's getting stronger. He has a giant head so doesn't look like he's going to be an early sitter like Thad was. (That's fine! I want him to take his time growing up.)
• Battling thrush AGAIN. Third time. Skipped taking him into the doctor and am trying a few things at home that seem to be working. 
• Bath time is his absolute favorite thing in the world. I love it.
• It's kind of crazy... he's built differently than Thad, but kind of the same too. His arms, legs, and feet are shorter and stubbier. But he's still tall. And Atti's head is bigger and shaped differently, but they have the same nose and mouth I think. Definitely the same smile: 
   
  
  
  Huh. From there his legs don't look that much shorter...

For once, it seems like it's been an eternity since I've updated.

In the middle of it all, months are flying by - I can't believe it's almost June. Atticus is growing and changing ridiculously quickly, and becoming more fun each day.

I started back at work May 1st. I was hoping to ease in, but kind of got thrown right back into the thick of it. It's quieted down since, but it was a crazy way to start. Atti started daycare on May 8th. As it would, it's taking some adjusting for him. He's still having trouble napping there. I'm hoping that'll change soon... as he's not getting enough sleep (though not really showing it).

Otherwise, not a whole lot going on. Michael's off school for the summer and I am VERY MUCH enjoying having him home to help in the evenings, and I know Thad is too. Mike's a huge help even when he has a ridiculous amount going on, so it's nice that he's a little less stressed now.

We leave tomorrow morning for our trip to Pittsburgh. My dad's side is all getting together for the first time in a looong time, so everyone is making the trek out. I was trying to decide how to get us out there... there was taking a plane... Memorial Day weekend, in the middle of severe weather season in the midwest, with the possibility of flight delays, etc. Plus, not knowing how Thad would react to the plane. Then there was driving... 13 hours in a car (no stops) with a 3-year-old, and then a 3-month-old that despises being in the car 60% of the time. That sounded a little like torture. In exploring I found that train is actually an option. It takes a ridiculously long time (22 hours), and we have to hang out in Chicago for a bit, but... no security lines to get through, we can bring our own food, extra leg space, Thad can get up and walk around as much as he wants. You can take an insane amount of luggage. So, train it is. The second half of the trip there (and first part on the way back) is overnight, and we splurged for a family sleeper room, so hopefully we don't disturb too many people when Atticus cries. Hopefully Thad will really enjoy it; I'm kind of looking forward to the scenery, and being able to walk Atti around if he's cranky. I'm sure I'll have all kinds of stories next month...

The only other thing that I can't remember if I reported on, is that we saw a pediatric opthamologist about his hemangioma, since it grew so quickly. She checked his eyes, and they're doing great, so we held off on medication last month. We see her again in a few weeks and I might push a little harder to start it then, we'll see. It doesn't bother him at all, I'm just worried about it ulcerating before it starts to fade.

• He's 11 pounds, 5 ounces, and 24 inches. Barely holding onto 5th percentile for weight. So he's five pounds and four inches bigger from his birth stats.
• Still mostly in size 1 diapers, though I'll probably switch to size 2 when we run out. I force him into his 0-3/3 month clothes, but 3-6/6 month fit a lot better at this point.
• He's eating four ounces basically every 3 hours. After he goes down for the night he'll sleep 4-5 hours, which is nice, but I don't go to bed until he's about halfway into that stretch. Oops. 
• He goes to bed around the time Thad goes to bed. Gets put into his swaddle up, bottle, and conks out. Still doesn't need his paci to fall asleep initially, which is great because he's the WORST at keeping it in.
• He's sleeping in his crib most of the night. I try to make him sleep on his back for part of it, to try to get him used to it, but he fidgets and fidgets until he wakes up, so I put him on his stomach and he's out cold.
• He's happier and awake for about an hour after he wakes up for his bottle. He plays, watches what's going on around him, then is ready for cuddles and his paci, and a nap. Unless he's at daycare because why sleep there.
• Still such a cuddler. But on his terms. He likes holding onto blankets, and during the day when he's ready to sleep he prefers to be held basically facing you, with his arm around your side. But at night when I bring him into bed when I just can't stay awake, he no longer wants to be contained.
• He is also a giant wiggle worm, like his brother was. Has started kicking a ton. The other night I put him to sleep on his stomach and when I woke up again he had managed to turn 180 degrees and was at the other end of his crib. WHILE swaddled. Just. How.
• Becoming ticklish, talks mostly to his big brother.
• He is ALL ABOUT ceiling fans. And differing contrasts. But seriously I can put him on the floor of our living room and he just talks and laughs at the fan. If it's not going he seems concerned.
• He still has a patch of hair on the back of his head (hello, mullet), but the rest has kind of disappeared... but it's growing back in blond.
• Not quite grabbing things yet, but I'm sure that's coming soon. I usually go by his adjusted age for milestones still since three weeks can make quite a difference at this point.
  Looks like he's putting on most of his weight in his cheeks.
• He's still approximately the size Thad was at the same gestational age (about 2 months for Thad). He was about a pound heavier and 0.5 inch longer.

• As of Friday, he was 9 pounds, 13 ounces, and 22.5 inches long. Growing, growing! Up 3 pounds and 2.5 inches from birth.
• In size 1 diapers, and 0-3/3 month clothes. Still have a few newborn things out, but he's mostly too tall for them. His socks are finally fitting!
• In addition to Atti, you can hear him be called Little Bit, Ty-Ty, Growler
• Because of his reflux, we have to cap his feedings, so he's getting between 3 and 3.5 oz every 2-3 hours. Even at night. I haven't gotten more than 2.5 hours of sleep in a row since he was born. 
• I've mostly integrated him into Thad's bedtime, because I have no choice on nights when Michael isn't here. He gets jammies, swaddled, and then a bottle while we're reading or playing games with Thad. Once he's asleep he does his first sleep stretch in his crib.
• Still sleeping on an incline. Working hard to have him sleep in his bassinet that we've inclined, so we don't have a repeat Thad situation with hating the crib.
• He doesn't handle the traditional swaddles very well. He'll sleep in them at night for a bit, but eventually gets super mad and wants his hands by his face. So we've been using Swaddle Up swaddles, which are awesome. 
• He would really rather sleep on his stomach. I think sometimes because it helps his tummy feel better. So we're working on tummy so he'll get to rolling over one of these weeks. 
• Morning is his best time. After I release him from his swaddle he's usually got some smiles and is awake until his next bottle. The rest of the day he eats, hangs out a little, and sleeps. Until...
• After about 4 or 5 pm he gets cranky. Not sure if it's overstimulation or what, but until he's swaddled up for the night it's almost easier to just put him in the carrier and lug him around.
• Thad was very expressive as a baby. Smiled early and often. Made lots of faces. Atti is much more reserved. Have to work hard to get smiles, has plenty of judgmental and angry faces, even though he's not really an angry baby.
• Loves, loves, loves looking at lights. More than anything else.
• His hemangioma keeps growing. It's getting closer to his eye, so we're going to ask about that at his appointment. It doesn't bother him, and to me it's just what makes him, him. Chances are it'll grow for the next year before starting to go away.
• He prefers to be just in his diaper, as long as it's not cold.
• His new hair is definitely coming in blond. Another fair haired boy.
• Loves holding onto whatever is near when cuddling - burp rag, shirt, blanket, paci holder, hoodie strings.

• I'll come back to add in weight and length after his checkup Monday. A week ago he was 6 pounds, 10 oz, and 20 inches. So tall and skinny. Update: 7lbs11oz, 21 inches
• He still fits better in NB diapers, though I'm using some size 1s because we have so many. Swims in anything we put him in - NB or 0-3 months - as far as sleepers. He's long enough for onesies to fit, but ones with long sleeves he manages to pull his hands and arms inside. None of his socks fit because of his skinny little legs. Plus Thad stretched out all the socks.
• Nicknames include Atti, Ty, Ty-Ty, baby penguin. I occasionally call him growler because he growls every time we burp him and sometimes just randomly.
• He's drinking about 3 ounces every few hours. Starting to move towards 3.5.
• He eats every 2-3 hours. I think he might start stretching it out at night... but will I be able to keep sleeping?
• At night now he starts getting cranky around the time Thad goes to bed, and once he's ready for bed and swaddled he usually falls asleep pretty quick. Sleeping either in his rock n' play, or bassinet.
• During the day he sometimes naps while I hold him, or I'll put him in his Boppy nest.
• He's becoming more alert, which is fun. Still a sleepy dude, but he's having more awake time. He'll track things short distances. 
• Actually loves tummy time? It's weird. He's getting so much stronger!

Here I was thinking I had at least one more "bump update" to do before Atticus got here.

Someone out there like to take my plans and crush them to remind me I'm not in control.

So I guess this will be a birth story/update on our little guy.

The morning of Friday the 24th I woke up in quite a bit of ligament pain. More than I'd have been having. It was supposed to be my last day working in the office (was going to finish my time before the birth working at home...) so I really wanted to get in there. Got ready for work, started the drive. About halfway there I realized that my pain was kind of coming in waves, and was less ligament pain, more just "ow". So I turned around and went home. I logged onto work from there and frantically got some stuff situated because I knew I was going to have to go to the doctor to get checked out.

Still mostly convinced what was happening wasn't a big deal. After all, I was only 37 weeks. I went 41 with Thad.

Called the doctor around 9:30, told the nurse what was going on and they wanted me to go ahead and come in to be looked at. I went ahead and grabbed my packed bags for the hospital, just in case. But driving into the doctor I convinced myself I was making this pain up. When I got there, my doctor went ahead and checked me (things I thought I got to avoid with a c-section...) and found my cervix was still closed. She even had trouble finding it. Cool. Decided to hook me up just to see if what I was feeling was contractions.

Sure enough...

I was having regular contractions. Ruh roh, raggy. So then I got to hang out and get two bags of IV fluids to try to stop labor. During that time my pain decreased a little, and I was feeling more Braxton-Hicks contractions, so I figured we were well on our way to okay. After the second bag I got hooked back up to the monitors... and was still having regular contractions. Ugh. Okay. So the doctor decided to check me again. After she was done she was like, "Well... you're definitely at a 4." I'm sorry, what? It's been like... 2 hours?? So she said she was going to talk to the lead surgeon for my c-section, but it'd be done this afternoon and I should head to the hospital.

Okay, fine.

The next hour or so was a frenzy of calling everyone, trying to figure out who would be able to help with Thad, actually starting to feel my contractions (oww), running home to grab Michael and more stuff, and then going to the hospital. Getting hooked up there, answering an insane number of questions, having contractions every two minutes. Whirlwind. I walked back to the OR at 2:30 or so.

The surgery itself went great. I got my spinal, didn't shake nearly as bad this time. They had to work through some scar tissue, but it went well, outside of some pulling I was fine, and at 3:15, Atticus Ronan came out with a little screech, and then a lot of crying. He was 6 pounds 2 ounces, and 20 inches long. Not bad for an early guy. I got all stapled up and then to recovery. We were all hanging out, and kind of noticed Atti grunting a little bit when he was breathing. I knew that was a sign babies are having trouble, so we asked about it. At first were reassured that he came out screaming and it was probably nothing. But it kept going on, so they said they would check it out when they took him to the nursery to get cleaned up.

And he hasn't left the nursery since.

He was having some trouble breathing. Chest x-ray showed quite a bit of fluid on his lungs - not out of the ordinary for an early baby born by c-section. The doctor also noticed a little spot on his lungs that might be pneumonia, but his blood work looked okay so we held off on doing anything. That first day you could tell he wasn't feeling great. Didn't want to be touched or anything. He was breathing too fast, and having trouble keeping his pulse ox up. The next day they did a repeat chest x-ray, and the fluid level had gone down, but then you could clearly see the pneumonia. So he started antibiotics that night.

Since then it's been ups and downs. We can tell the antibiotics are working, but then we ran into he's early and having feeding issues. Plus reflux. The pediatrician started him on zantac, and we switched to a sensitive formula. He seems to be doing better, last night he had a great night. This morning he ate his whole feeding without dropping his pulseox down below 90. Hoping that he keeps improving so we can move him to the room they let us stay in at some point.

This whole thing has been a rollercoaster. On the whole, he is sick, but I know there are much sicker babies out there. And if we've had this many ups and downs, I can't even imagine what it's like for those other parents. Then there's the whole, we also have another kid at home who misses his parents. Now that I've been discharged, one of us is staying here at night, and the other is with Thad. He's done so well with the family and friends picking him up and taking care of him, I wondered if he even missed us. Then Michael went home around bedtime one night and it was apparent. And then yesterday when I told him he and daddy were going to go home and sleep he got really upset and said he didn't want to go home. It's those little things that completely break my heart. I know, hopefully soon, we'll all be home together, and I'm very much looking forward to that.

I'm recovering well, physically. It's easy to get up and move when you have the motivation of a cute little person down the hallway in the nursery. Emotionally, as I said, it's been tough. But not just on me, on Michael too. He wrote on facebook the other day how there isn't enough support for partners through this whole process. And he's very right about that. I haven't been the greatest about it, either. We need to make sure our non-birthing partners are supported and loved just the same as our mothers are.

This is way longer than I thought it'd be. But one last paragraph as a giant thank you to everyone who has reached out, offered to help, and spared thoughts and prayers. It  means the absolute world to us to know we have people out there thinking about our Atti and want him to get healthy. We are sending out mass amounts of love to all of you. I don't think I'll ever be able to completely convey my gratitude for all that's been done for us. Family and friends have stepped up in huge ways and I am so thankful.

I know I need to post pictures... but most are on my phone and I haven't had a chance to move them over yet. Obviously most of you get here through FB, where there have been plenty of pictures. Once we break loose of this joint I'll be able to get some newborn pictures done of Atticus. And I'm sure in the coming days we'll have one of Thad and "my TyTy", as he calls him.

Again... thank you to everyone. I'll be back in a couple days because a CERTAIN SOMEONE is turning 3... :)

Happy Holidays!!

As I was packing up to go to my parent's yesterday, I remembered I was going to need to write this blog post, since somehow it's been another four weeks. Can time just slow down for just a second?

Or, maybe not. I'm pretty sure Michael is really tired of hearing me complain about every little thing. And my poor little sister (now a co-worker) gets to hear me moan and groan every day for eight hours, too. They're just so lucky.

We survived another month. Paw Patrol Live was a lot of fun (mostly for Thad. I found it to be a weird, surreal experience). My mom is officially home safe from Alaska. During the snowy weekend last weekend I managed to mostly finish T2's rug (which is more of a... very small foot towel or something. Like 2 feet by 2.5 feet. Oh well.), build his crib, and at least buy the stuff to make his door hanging.

PLUS I managed to buy/wrap most of the presents needed for the next few days. Win.

Found out I passed my 1-hour glucose test, which I failed with Thad. Also had an ultrasound, where everything looked good. My anterior placenta is high enough it shouldn't mess with the c-section.

The next month will hopefully be quieter. Michael has his comprehensive exams to officially become a doctoral candidate in less than a month. (I think that's right. I know he has big, scary tests in the middle of January that are really important.) My goals are to figure out my FMLA stuff for work. Wash all the baby clothes. Make sure I can get the infant seat installed in both cars. Deep clean our carpets.

Oh, and Thad has a big brother class at the hospital at the beginning of January. Plus admissions hospital stuff. Things getting verrry real. Doctor appointments every two weeks starting at the beginning of January.

Exponential growth has begun. My pregnancy with Thad messed up my belly button, so it's already an outtie and it bugs me? What a weird thing to bug me. But it does.

As my family descends at my parent's house for Christmas, I'm especially thankful we all live close enough to get together and play games, have fun, and eat a ton of food together. I love being with them, and I'm glad Thad has a chance to terrorize his older cousins. One of my happy places is my parent's house relaxing on their couch.

Though, sharing a bed with Thad is less than idea. He's decided not to lay on his cot very long at night so I didn't even bother bringing it.



Labor Signs: None! A few Braxton-Hicks every day.

Hey, look, it's been another fast four weeks. And officially one month until Christmas (yikes).

We're lucky I remembered to do this update at all. I just finished six hours of Gilmore Girls. Worth it.

Anyway. Viability! This is one of my favorite milestones. I know that everyday T2 stays put, the better chance he has at survival, but it's nice knowing we're scooting closer to the end. Another busy month ahead of us, including photographing another wedding, going to Paw Patrol Live, and my mom coming back from Alaska!

Reading my post from Thad at 24 weeks. I was worried about the nursery and finishing his rug on time. We do have the luxury this time of knowing the boys will eventually share a room, so the only thing I really need to do is build his crib. Which he won't be sleeping in for awhile but I'll probably do soon anyway. Then the rest of the stuff - clothes, car seat, rock n' play... that needs to all be cleaned but that won't get done until at least the start of the new year. I definitely STARTED his rug. But... like barely. I should probably get on that.

But hey, we've (hopefully) settled on a name. That's a good thing.

Unless you ask my dad. He doesn't think kids should be named until they're born. Sorry, dad. Your fault for raising a Type A planner.



Labor Signs: None!