Baby #?

Well I was going to write this much sooner but somehow I find I just don't have much time any more. After the holidays though it gets better. For those of you on facebook you would have seen my status from last night. For those that aren't 'It's a BOY'

Yes we are expecting another little boy in April. I am just not sure what to say on what baby # this is. I guess this is hope for a second living child but really it is my 4th pregnancy. Also this is my second son. So it is baby #? for now. When people ask how many kids I have I usually say 1 living and leave it at that.

We are happy but nervous having another boy. A girl would have been easier as we have all the girl stuff already but then I would always wonder about my little boy. Now I am getting my little boy but not Shane so it is a weird feeling to me. I think I have known for a while though that it is a boy because of Lauren. Right away when we asked her she told us it was a "Broder" it didn't matter how we asked that was always her answer. Oddly I don't think she has a clue what a brother or sister or boy or girl is. Maybe just maybe she was told and she knew.

Everything is good so far. We aren't doing the testing this time and will wait till he is born to get him tested. We will start him on meds right away though while we wait for results. I am feeling so much movement and it is a weird thing. I never felt this much ever. Even with Lauren with my anterior placenta I couldn't feel her so this is way stronger than I ever felt. I have no idea what I am in for! I am happy though because I know this is my last pregnancy so I want to enjoy every part of it. I am due the 5th of April I just want him to stay in till April. I would like 2 April babies.

Sleep

I know I seem to post a lot about sleep or lack thereof. This is no different. I knew having a child that my sleep would change, but I have to say I am looking forward to when she is a teenager and sleeps all day because I will be too. Her sleep has actually gotten way better lately though with her in a bed. She normally goes to bed around 9ish and is up at 7:30. She has had 2 colds though in the last month and for about 4 days for each one sleep almost never happens. On Saturday though we got ourselves a new bed. We decided to jump up to a king and I was so excited. I worked my 12 hour day and all I could think about was a good night sleep in the new bed. Then I realized that Lauren was still sick and I would actually spend very little time in the new bed. When I got home I had a long talk with her telling her to sleep all night so I could enjoy the new bed. Well she must have listened because she didn't wake till 7:30. The only problem was that Tony and I didn't sleep that great and woke up so sore. We think that we got so used to the divots and sleeping wrong in the old bed that now that we have a new proper bed it is making our bodies sleep properly and now they hurt. This means that we both need to go to the chiropractor and soon to fix us. I am working nights tonight and will give the bed a try again in the morning. I am so looking forward to sleeping all day in the bed to myself and I am sure that I will be fine. My back is killing me though and I am sure it is because of work and not the bed so I am still going to go for an adjustment anyway. I am just so happy with a brand new king size bed. Although I know that at this moment both Lauren and Tony are sleeping soundly in it and I am a bit jealous of that fact. When I am on nights and Tony has to get her to my parents on his way to work he has found that if she is too hyper at night and won't go to bed he puts her in ours and she thinks it is like a treat and she sleeps great for him. It is funny knowing that is one thing that he said he would never do it have a baby in our bed but I guess she isn't really a baby anymore.

The next big thing we have coming up is that i have to sign her up for preschool. I can't believe she is old enough for preschool. I have to sign her up at 10PM on Tuesday. It is such a weird time to do it but I guess it is the first year online to sign up and they don't want the system to crash. I just hope that I get her in to the one I want. I have 2 options that I am going for: Uplands and Newlands and hopefully one has a space for her.

Mix of stuff

Well I thought I was doing good writing all these blogs but apparently I was hitting "save" instead of 'post' so they weren't posted. So I decided to just put it all in one.

Lauren had her MRI and lumbar puncture (spinal tap) done at the end of Sept. We had to take her in after fasting all morning. She did really well though and wasn't getting fussy. I think she was just happy to have both of us she didn't really notice. They took her in for the MRI first as we were told that she would have the LP done right after while she was still asleep. Tony went in with her while they gave her the first bit of the med to put her under. She was asleep in less than 3 minutes. We were told it would take about an hour and that we were to wait in surgical daycare. No big deal, we went and got a drink and a snack and sat and waited, and waited and waited. Finally after 2.5 hours and us getting worried the nurse called our name to go to the recovery room as she was waking up. We got there just as she opened her eyes. She looked so bloated which I thought was weird and she was really out of it which again was weird because she normally wakes up very easy from general anesthetic. That is when the nurse said "isn't midazolam great, they don't remember a thing". I asked her why she had midaz as we hadn't Okayed that. She asked us if we had seen the DR. I told her no one came and talked to us or told us a thing. She went and got the chart and the MRI went great and she stayed under. Then they had a hard time finding someone from metabolics to come down. The normal Dr we have has a new job outside of BC now so it wasn't her so they sent a new Dr down. The new Dr took his time and they couldn't keep her under without giving her lots more meds as she was waking up so they gave her midaz for the LP. I was pissed. That meant she was awake for it but it sedates her enough that she doesn't remember it. Also they poked her 5 times. That means she may not remember it but she would have been screaming during it and fighting them so they would have been holding her down. I did not authorise that at all. She did great after though and was starving so we let her eat earlier than they wanted. They also told us that she would be groggy all day and that she will be wanting to just sit around. Well they were wrong there. She was up and running and not stopping all afternoon. She pigged out at dinner and went to bed late. We have an appointment at the end of this month with neurology and metabolics to go over the results and I have never met the metabolic Dr's that they have me scheduled with but you can bet I am raising a huge fit over the fact that she was given Midaz and awake for a procedure I only agreed on as she would be asleep for it. As much as I love Children's hospital for the work they do they have screwed poor Lauren and I with so many mistakes it really pisses me off.

Also she is walking and talking a lot now. The walking is still unsteady but she is doing it. The talking she is doing great and now I wonder why I wanted it so bad. She spent 2 hours straight today 'talking' she didn't stop. I was trying to talk on the phone and make appointments and she didn't stop. I am not sure she even took a breath LOL. She says words all the time and I wonder when she learned it as I swear there isn't a word she can't say when she wants to. Including when she fell over and said 'Crap, damn' those really got me as it isn't something I say so I would love to know where she learned it from.

Lauren is now in her big girl bed too. This works for all of us. She still wakes up once a night. She doesn't get out of bed though, she just screams at the top of her lungs "MOMMA". It is easy to settle her as we just get into bed (it is a double) with her and she goes right to sleep. The intention is to just stay till she falls asleep and then leave but we always fall asleep too. At least in the bed there is room to lay down.

There is much more but I will leave the rest to another post. I have a few busy weeks ahead but I am sure there will be good news posts soon.

Sleep Regression

I think this is worse than having a newborn. At least with them you know you can feed them and they will usually go back to sleep. It is getting really hard getting up with Lauren lately and it is getting to the point that it can be every 1.5 hours to 2 hours. She will scream and scream till we go in there. We can't leave her because she will hurt herself. The other night we were downstairs when she started so it took us about 10 minutes (I put my pj's on first as I thought I would be in there a while) to get there and by that time she had hit her mouth so bad and split her lip open that I had to wash down the rails of her crib, change her shirt, wash her face and hands and take her stuffed lamb to the wash as it was all covered in blood. Then she slept even worse because she kept waking up looking for her lamb and it wasn't there as he was drying in the hall. I spent most of the night sleeping beside her crib as all the sleep consultants have told us to not take her out of bed and to keep telling her that it is bedtime. We were wondering if it was pain from her teeth as I am sure she has a cavity despite us brushing her teeth twice a day and never giving her a bottle or anything in bed. Then her infant development worker reminded us that this is a normal thing for kids when they are learning a new skill. It is just that most of the kids are over this around one as they are walking by then. Right now she is really working on walking and talking. In the last month her speech has exploded and she is basically walking all the time just unsteady now. She oddly has been doing so much better with both of them since she has been sleeping awful. Infant development thinks that she is working so hard on learning them that she isn't sleeping because there is so much going on in her head right now. I sure hope they are right and that she hurries up and learns it then because I can't do this much longer. I am exhausted.

I am back

I have been gone from here for a few months. I have tried to get in but it wouldn't let me sign in. I finally figured it out today but using a different browser, I also figured out how to get the browser to work on my phone so I could update it while I am at work.

Lots has happened in the last few months. I have had my holidays from work which was great. We went to the lake like usual but this year it was actually sunny and hot the entire time. The only bad thing to come out f it was that Lauren has become an awful sleeper again. Just before we went away we finally got her sleeping from about 7:30-8 at night till 6-6:30 in the morning. It was wonderful. At the lake though for some reason she became a very light sleeper and would wake up at any sound including us rolling over in bed at the other end of the trailer. I can tell you that many times Tony and I would be in so much pain having to move but didn't as we didn't want her to wake up. Now we are home and she wakes up multiple times a night and won't put herself back to sleep. I am so exhausted from fighting her every night to lie down and go back to sleep. Then we are lucky if we can get her to sleep past 5am. Although today she woke at 4 and Tony took her to her bed (she is still in her crib but her bed is in the spare room to be moved soon to her room) and they slept in there till 8. Maybe just maybe she is starting to get back on track. I am hoping once she has her bed in her room that she will sleep better. She has never tried to climb out of her crib but we don't want her to figure that out either. I just need her to sleep as I am so exhausted. She takes a 1 hour nap (that is her choice not mine) and I can usually sleep then too. I would love for the nap to be longer but that is it. It is almost to the minute an hour. If we are busy though she won't have one and then she is a bear at night.

She has also started walking and talking so much more. She can totally walk but it is like she is cautious and scared to fall. I think that is the problem with learning to walk at 2 rather than 1 is that her brain knows how she can get hurt and she doesn't want to. She will walk if we aren't watching her or in the play area at home but down the halls she will hold the wall or want to hold our hands. It is so much easier on my back though to not be carrying her all the time.


I will hopefully have more time to update more as I go and when I am not at work now that I know how to sign back in here.

Royal Wedding

I will admit it that I loved it. I couldn't stay up and watch it though because we had to be at Children's for 8 am which meant leaving by 6:30. I did PVR it though on 2 channels so that I could get different commentaries on it. I loved watching it. I think everyone looked so good. I kept thinking about her parents. I am sure when she was growing up they were hoping she would find someone nice and be happy. I am sure that never in their wildest dreams did they ever imagine that one day she would become Queen of England. It is my dream to one day spend some time with the royal family. I don't mean just meet them quickly and in a special meeting though. I want to spend like a week with them and see them as a normal family behind the scenes from what most people get to see. I would love it. The closest I have got is that when I went to Europe with guiding we got to stand inside the gates and watch the changing of the guard at Buckingham Palace and I thought we were so special. Did see any royalty though. I know that a lot of people aren't interested but I love everything to do with it and I would love to be a part of it in someway. I also think that Harry and Pippa are cute but I don't think they would ever get together even though a huge crowd thinks they should.

Apology and happy post

First I reread my last post and almost deleted it. It was kind of harsh. The majority of people have been great. Just a few that aren't are making me mad. They know because I told them but they don't seem to care. So I am going to change to a happy post instead. I have a few good friends that have kids the same age as Lauren and it has been great to get together and be normal. We can sit and talk and it feels great. I can be myself around them and it is fine. I can vent if i need to or talk about something else. They have all asked me if I am trying again and it doesn't upset me because of how they ask. They don't say "when are you trying" they all asked IF I was going to try again. I am very thankful for these great friends that have really helped by allowing me to be me and have Lauren get a play date in and have a great time.

2 years ago today I was so excited to meet my little girl. I was supposed to be induced so I got up early and called the hospital for the time. They had me come in at 8. I was excited and a little scared. I was already having some very small contractions but not much. When we got there we were told that it was busy and I couldn't be induced. I was so upset. My Dr called when I went home and had me come in to see if she could sweep my membranes and see if that would help. I also then went and walked and walked. Nothing worked. I went to bed that night hoping that I could get induced the next day. I called the hospital early and they told me I could come in. Well 8 1/2 hours later I was holding my little girl. I kind of laughed at the nurses that told me that it is usually the next day you deliver with your first induction. They were wrong. My body was ready once my water broke and moved very quickly. It was the same with Shane though that as soon as my water broke it was only a couple of hours. I can't believe that my little girl will be 2 tomorrow. She has been through a lot in the last 2 years but she is doing great. Just 1 year ago she couldn't even sit by herself now she is almost walking. She can walk and we have got 3 steps out of her but she chooses not to. It can be frustrating for us but she will do it when she is ready. Next Friday she will be developmentally tested so we will see what happens. I have come to the conclusion though that what the test says and what she does is totally different. A 2 year old doesn't always do what you want them to so it can look like she doesn't know how to do stuff but really she just doesn't want to. I will update when I hear what they think is her level now.

Dos and Don'ts

I just thought this would be a good post to do that others could use. This will work for miscarriages and stillborns.

Don't:

Tell the parents that at least they can get pregnant - That is nice but unless I can carry the child to term it doesn't do much good.

Tell them that at least they have a wonderful child already. Yes I do thanks I am happy I have her but I did want my son as well.

Stop calling and seeing how they are doing. The worst thing is having friends abandon you when you could really need them.

Pretend nothing happened. If when you ask questions they say they don't want to talk then fine but don't change the subject when they do talk about it.

Don't ask them why they would have named the child since they weren't going to live. I happen to think of my son as my child and he had a name. I had to fill in a death certificate for him and it asked for his name. He is registered as a person albeit a stillborn person but still a person.

Don't say that a D&C would have been better so that I didn't have to go through labour. First unless you know what you are talking about keep your mouth shut. A D&C done on a baby at 23 weeks means that they go in and cut it up to remove it. How is that better in anyway. Yes he was dead but I didn't want him cut up.

Don't tell them to remove the pictures that they have of the child that are up in their own home. How dare you tell me that I can't have pictures of my son in my house. If you don't like it then don't look. I don't have them out noticeable but I do have them for me.

Don't tell her to 'not let this get you down' about trying again. You have no idea what it is like to lose a child so you don't know how much this affects you.

Don't have the first thing out of your mouth 'when are you trying again' Give them time to grieve the loss of this child, to get themselves back to normal. Actually never ask this. You don't know all the background. Maybe they can't try again. Maybe there is more to it. This shouldn't actually be asked to anyone ever. What if the person can't have kids and it brings up bad memories. Unless you are the person carrying the egg or the person with the sperm you are not allowed to ask this.

Do

Send a card if you wish. They actually make ones for situations like this which is sad but they are out there.

Send a message letting them know that you are thinking of them, Give them time to respond though.

Ask questions, not just how they are doing, but what the name was, how big was the child, who did s/he look like.

Take meals, no one feels like eating or cooking but if the food is there it is easy.

Do let them vent if they need to and just listen. Unless you have been through it you don't understand some of the frustration that is building up. Anger is part of the grief process.

Do ask to see the pictures if there is any if you want. But make sure you really want to see them. Not all of them will look like a 'sleeping baby' It will depend on how old or how long the baby has been gone. Shane looked pretty good to us but he was our son. He had passed away a few days before he was delivered so he was 'wrinkly'

Do remember that although there isn't a baby at home the mother went through labour and delivery. She may still have her milk come in and go through the same thing a mother would that is bringing her baby home with her.


Hopefully this helps a bit and if anyone has anything to add please do. I had wonderful gifts given to us although I didn't actually expect anything for a loss of a child. Food brought over, a plant from a high school friend, he thought that I could plant it after so that I can use it as a memory. A gift card to get out for dinner to help with trying to be normal, it was a nice thing to do as a family without stress of what was happening. I also got some wonderful cards that meant a lot. A group of women that I had never met but were part of my April moms group on WTE got a star in Shane's name. The star is registered and everything so if someone finds it and looks it up it is called Shane Alexander. I can always look up at it and know he is there. It is on the big dipper so it is easy for me to find. These little things helped. The emails from people just letting me know that they were thinking of me we wonderful as well.

I also unfortunately had people do a lot of the don'ts and that hurt but maybe one day they will learn. Some of them just didn't know any better and some just don't care and don't think before talking. If you haven't been through it then think before talking first and please don't think you have any clue what a grieving parent is going through if it is a miscarriage or a stillborn.

Hard day

I thought i was doing better. I was feeling better and more normal. Then yesterday was one of my darkest days. I was packing up all of Lauren old clothes that don't fit. We were packing them away and Tony mentioned that some cousin was going to get spoiled. He was packing away all her old toys that she doesn't use anymore as well. I told her that one day her cousins would be playing with them and she could say that she gave them to them. He then said something about maybe even her nieces and nephews could use them. It was then that I noticed that she will never have nieces or nephews. She will never be an aunt. I know that if her siblings never had kids she wouldn't either but now it isn't even an option. She won't even have a sibling to play and run around with. I was packing up all her clothes in tears. I should be going through them and getting out anything that was gender neutral for my son to wear instead of packing it away for good. I want to be selfish and never pass it on but that isn't good either. None of our siblings is even thinking of having kids right now but we will still pass on all the baby stuff when they do. It seems the closer I get to my due date the worse I get. I go between wanting to be pregnant still and wanting to be pregnant again. Unfortunately Tony is done and doesn't want to try again. A miscarriage, a very sick child at birth and a stillborn son is enough for him. I thought I was getting to the acceptance stage of grief but apparently I am just hitting the anger. I am sorry to those who have been in my line of fire, I just seem to have a very short fuse. I am trying to get through it with my friendships intact and hoping to keep my marriage a happy one too but even Tony has learned to leave me alone for a bit. I do have a happy post about pictures we got done but I will post that another time.

I am back

Well it has been a while again but I am back. I am doing okay physically and emotionally I am getting there. I have much more good days than bad days now. It is more like bad moments. I am trying to be normal again and having Lauren really helps with that. I have to be normal for her. Right now we are working hard to really get our house organised. We moved in July and we still haven't unpacked everything. It will be done before the end of April though. Part of it was the renos we had to do in the suite that took longer than expected and we couldn't put anything in there while they were working on it. Lauren is turning 2 in less than a month. I have no idea where the time went. That is the reason we will have the house done though. We are having her party here and most of the family hasn't seen the house so we want it all done. We aren't doing a big party or anything just family. That alone is a lot of people. She has lots of aunts and uncles. I am excited but can't believe she is that old.

Pet Peeve

I don't know why this bothers me so much but it does. Losing Shane was not a miscarriage. He was a stillborn. There is a difference and for some reason it bothers me when people say that it is sad I have had 2 miscarriages. When I miscarried I had to have surgery and it was hard and had cramping and it was sad. I am still saddened by it. This was completely different. I carried my son past the half way point in my pregnancy. I knew he was a little boy and I had seen him on numerous ultrasounds. I had felt him move and kick inside me. When he was gone I had to go through 36 hours of labour and deliver him. I had to fill out a certificate of stillborn death. I had to go to a funeral home and decide if I wanted burial or cremation or if I wanted a service for him. I wish that I never knew the difference between the 2 but now I do I want it to be called what it was. My son was born still. Part of me wishes it didn't end this way. I wish I could have held him breathing even for a short time. Although we would have had the follow up ultrasound on Thursday and we would have been told that he hadn't grown. I would not have terminated so I would have had to have him by csection and then he would have gone to the NICU if he even lived that long. He would have had a tube down his throat to help him breathe. Then the chances that he would have done well were almost nothing so we would have had to make a choice to turn off his life support. As hard as it was to lose him I know that God made the choice for us so that we didn't have to. He is at peace now and we will have the memories of a perfect looking little boy. We don't think that we will ever have another but I won't say that it for sure yet. At this point I am just way to scared to ever do this again yet I feel like I never got to experience a "normal" pregnancy where you feel your child move and kick. With Lauren I never did partly because of where the placenta was a because she didn't move much except for seizures. Shane very rarely if ever moved because of the low fluid. Maybe one day I will get to experience it maybe not.

RIP my sweet baby

Shane Alexander Miller was born still into the arms of God. 9:08am on Jan 12 2011. He weighed just over 9oz. His hands and feet looked so big and were so perfect. he was adorable but so small. We had a wonderful photographer from Now I Lay Me Down To Sleep come and take some wonderful pictures. We will get them in a few weeks. We also got a wonderful memory box that we aren't sure everything that is inside and we aren't ready to open yet.
I was induced starting at 8pm on Monday and after 6 doses of the pill the contractions weren't really doing anything. It is unheard of to make it to 6 doses which is the max. They then started the oxy where the max dose is 20 units and I got there as well. My body didn't want to let go. I only had to dilate to 5cm and my body didn't want to cooperate. After 36 hour of labour he was finally born. I did take lots of meds that i am not used to so I still feel weird but I was thankful for them at the time. Now we are home and have to go to the funeral home but we are just having family time for a while.

Good news/ Bad news?

Well I was going to post this morning that I had felt him moving this weekend so I was happy. I have my ultrasound booked for Thursday to check and see if he had grown and hopefully get to keep him inside me for a little longer. We do meet with the NICU team that day as well to let us know what we are in for. They will go over all the days that he could be delivered and what that means and what surgeries he may have. They will basically get us prepared for what we will see and what to expect.
Then comes the bad news. This morning I woke up to pee and was hoping to just see the little spotting that I had been having. I was wrong. Back to bright red blood and passed 4 huge clots of tissue and blood. This can't be a good sign at all. I haven't been feeling any cramping or contractions or anything but I figure that if I can pass clots then my cervix must be open. The bleeding is now back to heavy again. I will call my OB when she opens and see if I can get in to see her today. I have a funny feeling that there will be no heartbeat on the ultrasound machine. I really didn't want to lose my son and really didn't' want to this way. I wanted to give him the best chance possible to survive this. I am not sure where this path I have been given is going to take me. I don't know what is in it for him at this point. I am praying that he is still with us and that he is doing okay but I am trying to be realistic as well. Why does this stuff always happen when Tony is at work and i can't get a hold of him.

No news

Well here I sit at 22 weeks 1day and just don't know what is going to happen. I haven't felt him move in over a day now although when he does move it can be missed easily as there is very little fluid. I have tried and tried to find his heartbeat on the doppler but Lauren doesn't let me most of the time and she just rips it away and I can't leave her alone for more than 5 minutes to try it in private. THe bleeding has gone to almost minimal which at first I thought was a good thing for him. Now I am terrified that I can't hear the heartbeat and the reason the bleeding has almost stopped is that he is gone and of course the placenta would stop supplying blood to him so it would also stop bleeding. I can't get in to see my OB till next wednesday and she has a small ultrasound machine in her office that she could check for a heartbeat on. I don't get my detailed ultrasound for at least a week but everytime I call to try and figure out when the appointment will be I get trasferred around and then I get told I will get a phone call and never hear anything.
So needless to say I am scared and unsure of what is to come. I really don't want to lose my son. I have always wanted 2 kids and this is it for us. We will not have another one no matter what happens. THis was supposed to be an easy pregnancy and with him not having what Lauren has he was going to be nice and healthy. I am mad that this happened and scared that he really is gone. How do I go on I just don't know.