Gracie girl is here!

As usual, I am WAY behind on my blogging. That is what happens when you are chasing around a 16 month old and trying to care for a newborn!

Gracie arrived at 36 weeks 3 days on Wednesday, 7/22/09 at 2:53 PM. She weighed a whopping 7 lb 6.9 oz (not bad for a 36 weeker) and was 19.5 inches long.

I had an amnio done on Monday, 7/20 that came back indeterminate. My OB tossed around the idea of waiting until Friday to deliver, but she was concerned about my incision and if it would hold up with the contractions I had been having. She called me Wednesday morning around 9 AM and told me to come to the hospital and bring my hospital bag, but be prepared to go home. They wanted to monitor me for contractions and see what was going on. Of course I was contracting every 7 minutes when I got there because they had told me the night before to prep for a c-section, just in case, so I hadn't had anything to drink since midnight. They eventually spaced out to 15 minutes and then 30 minutes, etc. with fluids, but she was still worried about my incision and decided to section me that day. At 2 PM, I was brought to the OR and prepped for surgery. Once the spinal took effect they brought Ian in and 10 minutes later Gracie was out!! This is where all the drama begins. Apparently, Grace did not want to be shown up by her brother's story of survival and needed a story of her own.

The first thing my OB said when she opened me up was, "good thing we took her today". That was all I got. Once Grace was out, I had seen her and Ian was wisked off to the nursery with her she informed me that my incision had not held up well at all. In fact, my uterus was paper thin and they could see through my skin to the baby! She asked if we plan to have any more children and I said we were thinking about possibly a third, but if she told me it wasn't safe we would be done. She said she was going to go ahead and open my old, classical incision and remove some scar tissue. After that she would close it back up again and overlap the old incision to make it thicker so it would hold up again if we have another pregnancy. This was scary news and enough to make me think I may very well be happy with the two healthy children that I have. My doctor said if we had waited two more days like we were going to it wouldn't have been good. Once my surgery was over I had been on the table for 2.5 hours!

That being said, Gracie is here, she is healthy, I am healthy and that is all that matters. The Lord has blessed me with two beautiful, healthy children and two very amazing birth stories. I am very grateful for the countless blessings I have been given.

As of her one month check-up this past Monday she is 10 lb 1 oz and 20.7 inches long! She gained 2.5 pounds in 3 weeks!! Next month is her 2 month and Jacob's 18 month check-up. We are hoping Jacob will make the charts for his actual age this time. Last time he was still -3% for both height and weight and 75-90th for his head circumference!

This weekend we are off to Eastham, Cape Cod for our first vacation as a family of four! We are very excited for this time away and hope to post lots of pictures when we return!