Tatum Rae McFarlane Blay!

It's a GiRL!!!

Here's how it all went down...

On Sunday August 30th (my dad's birthday) I hadn't really noticed a lot of fetal movement. I felt some movement, but not as much as I normally do. I thought about going into Labour & Delivery that morning, but knowing that baby is usually most active at night, I decided to wait. So that night, I am laying in bed, and I feel nothing. I started poking around, and felt a couple little kicks, but barely. Being nervous parents, we called L & D and they told us to come in and get checked out. At 11pm we called my dad to come over and watch Rylan so we could go to St. Joe's. We got to St. Joe's at 11:30 and was hooked up to the monitors right away. Thankfully there was a strong heart beat and my mind was put to ease. Although, I guess my blood pressure didn't hear that the baby was fine and was still a little tense and higher than it should have been. So they kept me a little longer, took some blood and waited for my blood pressure to come back down.

We waited, and waited and waited. 3 deliveries and a c-section later the Dr. came in and told me that they would be inducing me the following day because I was 3 days overdue anyway. I REALLY, REALLY didn't want to be induced, but for the safety of our baby, I agreed.

At about 1:30am I had a cervical catheter put in since I was only 1.5cm dilated. I was crampy and contractions started immediately. I had this done when I had Rylan as well, so I knew what to expect. Once the catheter fell out with Rylan, the contractions stopped, so I didn't think anything of these ones. After being monitored for another hour, we were free to leave... about 4am! Since we left so late, the staff said that we would be called last for the induction the next day so we could rest... yeah right!

We got home and went to bed. I was still having pretty strong contractions that kept waking me up. I would sit up and look at the clock, then go back to sleep. The next contraction would come, I would sit up again, look at the clock again and I would completely forget what time I looked before! This went on for quite a while. Finally at 6am, I got up to pee and out came the catheter. I thought, sweet! The contractions will stop and I can finally get a decent sleep! Nope! They just kept on coming. At 8am I decided I should start timing the contractions for real and loaded up www.contractionmaster.com on the computer. (Awesome website for the labouring mother!) After about 1/2 an hour of timing, they were coming 1-3 minutes apart. They were painful, but not as painful as I remember with Rylan so I didn't think it was going to be the real deal.

Once again we called my dad to come over and watch Rylan. I told him not to rush, we still needed to shower and I was planning on doing my hair AND makeup. My dad got to our place at 8:45 and we were off to St. Joe's again!

Tony let me out at the door and went to park the car. Since both of us thought I would be getting sent home for false labour, we didn't bring the bag up with us. I got to triage and the receptionist asked if I had an appointment. I said, "No, I think I might be in labour." She kind of rolled her eyes at me, thinking that there is no way I could be in labour. I was pretty calm. So she sent me back to get checked... and I was already 7cm!!!

Baby was really low, and bag of water was bulging. The nurse said that if my water was to break on it's own, I would be having the baby within the hour! Tony had slipped out to get some Tim Horton's for us while I was getting checked so I quickly sent him a text to get his ass back up to L&D!! He got back up in time, thankfully! We walked back to the birthing suite (the same room I had Rylan in!). I quickly asked for an epidural. I was scared to death to push without it... I really didn't want to feel what it was like to get stitches down there!

Before the anesthesiologist could give me an epidural I had to have blood work and an IV started. So I had a nurse on each arm trying to get things going so I didn't miss the opportunity. As we waited for the anesthesiologist to come into the room the phone rang. It was the lab, one of the vials of blood got sent without a label, so they had to take my blood again! I started to panic a little bit thinking I wasn't going to get an epidural after all. The anesthesiologist was amazing. So nice and hilarious... except I was in a hurry and he just kept talking and talking and talking and all I could do was squeeze my legs tighter and tighter together to make sure this baby stayed in until that needle was in my back!

At 12pm our nurse (did I mention we also had the same nurse as we did with Rylan?) went for lunch. She was half joking, but asked if I could wait to have the baby until she got back. Not 5 minutes later, the urge to push was upon me. I paged the backup nurse and she came to check me. Sure enough, I was ready to push!
She called Mary (our nurse) to come back if she wanted to be there for the birth. Mary rushed back and I started pushing at 12:15pm. One contraction and one push later at 12:17 Tatum Rae McFarlane Blay made her grand entrance! Weighing 8lbs, 40zs and 19.5" in length. She was the same weight as Rylan and looks so much like her!

We are thrilled to pieces with our 2 girls... a dream come true!

40 + 2

And I wouldn't come near me! I am miserable!! Not to mention I can cry at the drop of a hat! They should change the due date to whatever 42 weeks is so you don't get your hopes up! If I thought my due date was Sept. 11th, I know I wouldn't be so miserable right now!

Where is baby?

So... I'm officially overdue. I never thought that would happen in a million years!
I don't even feel like this baby will be coming out anytime soon. I mean sure, I've had a few contractions and a couple other signs that indicate that the baby could come at anytime... but in my gut, I know s/he will keep me waiting even longer. I really don't want to be induced this time. I would like to experience what it's like to go into labour naturally. My next appointment with Dr. Crumley isn't until September 3rd and she said we would discuss induction then. Keep your fingers crossed that baby comes out before then!

I measured the circumference of my belly last night, just for fun. 47"... 47"!!! What?! That's 1" shy of 4 feet!! I'm only 5'1" tall! No wonder I'm so off balance!

Here is a picture of me last night... 40 weeks.
I am "full of baby" as Dr. Crumley would say. She was guesstimating that baby is on the high end of average in terms of weight. But she was just doing that by feel with her hands on my tummy. She guess around 8lbs. I hope she is right! I'm nervous about how big this baby could potentially be since Rylan came 2 weeks early and weighed 8lbs, 40zs. I have only gained 16lbs with this pregnancy so far and gained 25lbs total with Rylan. So who knows!?

Anyway, Rylan is napping, so I'm going to follow her lead and sleep the days away until baby # 2 decides to come out and meet the world! I'm sure Tony will appreciate a few hours without me around... I am miserable!!

Baby Pool

I forgot to mention the baby pool in the last post!
www.expectnet.com and enter Sib4Rylan as the game name in the top left corner. Good luck!

11 days?? Really??

So I just thought I would log on here and give a bit of an update on life... and that's when it hit me. I just saw my pregnancy ticker on the side of the page that said, "11 days left". 11 days?!!! That's not enough time! I am ready, most days. Yesterday I was definitely ready, today I'm sort of ready and tomorrow I will probably be far from ready!! Ok, I think my heart rate is coming back down now... wow... 11 days!

My brother called this weekend. It was sooooo great to hear his voice!! The first words out of my mouth that morning to Tony were, "I miss my brother. I wish he would call." A few hours later, my wish came true! He has a scheduled date to leave Afghanistan on October 22! Hopefully it doesn't change. We are planning on taking another road trip out to see him when he gets off of the plane/bus. I CAN'T WAIT!! I think we may have to consider flying this time. We will have a 22 month old and an approximately 2 month old. 16 hours in the car might be a little too much to ask. Plus I don't know if I could handle it again so soon myself. I'm not sure how Kev does it! Rylan made Kevin a drawing and we both wrote him a little letter to send over to him. When I was talking to him I asked him if there was anything he needed... he said no and that his favourite part about receiving packages from us were the letters and notes. So I have decided that he will be getting a note/letter from this house every week! We will write them and send them weekly, but he could get 2-4 weeks worth all at once because we just send everything to Belleville and then a military plane brings it to Afghanistan. If anyone needs his address I will post it. Send him a letter!!

F82782989 Cpl McFarlane KJ
2R22R BG 51 ENGR SQN
EROC TF 1-09 OP ATHENA
PO BOX 5058 Station Forces
Belleville, ON K8N 5W6

Rylan has really been growing up quickly over the last few weeks it seems. She has started stringing sentences together. The first sentence she put together was, "Mommy e two elbas". Which translates to Mommy has two elbows! Just last night she held up two fingers in a peace sign and said, "two!". She has the best look on her face when she knows she has accomplished something really great.

We had a great weekend by the pool. Finally some great summer weather! We had a BBQ get-together on Friday night with a few friends and their children. It was pretty hectic but fun! All the babies got together for a photo op... thanks to Laura for catching a good one! Ours didn't turn out so great!
Aren't they the cutest?! From L-R we have Claudia (3.5 months), Kristopher & Aubrey (4.5 months), Michael (18.5 months), Rylan (19.5 months), Lauren (3) and David (14 months).

It was really cool to watch Rylan interact with everyone. She really seemed to look up to Lauren. They were giving each other high fives and jumping on the bed together... fun times!

Tony's picture is in the London Free Press today! Him and another colleague represented LIBA and donated 50 fleece blankets to the Rotholme Family Shelter. (He's on the left!)
Well, it's time to jump in the shower and hopefully distract Rylan with some Treehouse so I can shower alone! She likes to get in the shower with me... but wants to be held! It's tricky washing your hair with one hand while holding a 27lb child with a medicine ball as a belly! I am trying to get back on here more regularly. If I am still pregnant by Friday I will have Tony take another belly picture (@ 39 weeks). If not, I will get one right before I leave for the hospital like I did with Rylan. Here is the latest picture of my belly...

36 weeks (2 weeks ago)

Sorry for the delay!

Well, after a month + long hiatus on the ol' blog... I'm back!

I could quickly fill you in on the last month, but I can't remember anything!!

How about I fill you in on the last few days? Let's start with yesterday morning...
I woke up at 6:30 to "Hi Momma!" and about 50 adorable little foot thumps from her room to ours. So cute!
Anyway, I went pee, same thing I do every morning and about 2-3 times in the night. I returned to bed with my happy little family for some snuggle time. That's when it hit me, I had to pee again! I felt like I had a full bladder again. How is that possible? It had literally been 30 seconds since I left the bathroom! I thought maybe it was a weird pregnancy thing and that maybe the baby was using my bladder as a stress release ball. So I got up and went to the bathroom again. This time nothing... but the feeling wouldn't disappear! I knew something was up, I thought maybe a UTI or bladder infection, common during pregnancy.
I waited until 8am to call my Dr. and make an appointment. The earliest I could be seen was 1:15 that afternoon. No problem. This feeling would be annoying, but not a huge deal. Rylan and I sat down and ate our cereal and I had a nice red raspberry tea. All of a sudden I started getting some really intense cramping on the left side of my abdomen. It kept getting worse and worse. I started to get freaked out a little bit. Could this be labour? I'm only 32 weeks, 4 days, how big would my baby be? Would he/she be able to breathe on their own yet? The pain kept getting worse, and worse, and worse! Tony was just getting ready to leave for work when I burst into the bedroom and told him that he had to take me to the hospital, and NOW! We packed up Rylan and headed off on the longest trip to the hospital of my life. Everyone was driving so slow, we hit every red light, everyone seemed to want to make a left turn in front of us. The pain kept getting worse, and moving into my back. Could this be kidney stones? Or is it back labour? My poor baby, he/she isn't ready to come out yet!
We get to St. Joe's and the nausea hit me. Tony was stopped at the 4 way stop and I just got out and headed to the door way. I probably could have used the extra 30 seconds in the car... because I got into the lobby and barfed my red tea and cornflakes all over the floor just past the revolving door. Not at all embarassing!! A lady came up to me and told me not to worry about it, housekeeping would be down to clean it up (sorry housekeeping!!) and pointed me in the direction of the bathroom. After I was sure there couldn't possibly be anymore tea/cornflakes left in my system I made a mad dash for the elevator.
I made it all the way to the triage desk and I must have looked pretty bad because they took me ahead of everyone else in line and got me into a room right away.
They put me on the monitors and sure enough I was contracting, but not regularly, and not badly enough to be causing that much pain. It was intense, like nothing I have ever experienced before in my life, or like anything I would ever want to experience again! I couldn't function, I couldn't cope, it was horrible. So after a few minutes that felt like eternity, I got some morphine. Phewf right? Wrong! It didn't even touch the pain!
They brought in a portable ultrasound machine and quickly checked the baby. Everything looked perfect or so they told me afterwards. The morphine kicked my ass and I couldn't keep my eyes open to watch! Tony said the baby was sucking it's thumb, breathing and scored an 8/8.
After a few hours I went down to radiology where they did an ultrasound on my kidneys. They couldn't see any stones, but they also couldn't see everything they wanted to because of the way the baby was positioned. I did have some dilation and fluid in my left kidney, which is sometime normal during pregnancy, if it was happening to my right kidney. But no obvious stones.
I still couldn't even keep a sip of water down, so they started an IV and decided I should stay over night. I already missed Rylan like you wouldn't believe... she went home with my mom shortly after we got to L & D.
I had the worst nights sleep I have had in a long time. I was up every hour and counting down until Tony was bringing Rylan to see me in the morning. Not to mention I was so uncomfortable because of my back pain. Around 1:30am I buzzed the nurse for some pain meds... I really hate doing that. I felt like a whiney baby! She was super nice and brought them right away with some ice chips and a giant styrofoam cup of water (I love those cups!). I slept for a good 3 hours in a row before having to get up to pee.
That's when I felt them... the stones... they were making their way down the path. They weren't quite ready to come out yet, but they were getting closer!
By 7:30 in the morning, the first one reared it's ugly head. I was actually kind of proud! I did it... it's out. There can only be one right? Then a couple of hours later, after my lovely visit with my beautiful daughter and Tony, and after my clear fluid breakfast (if you can even call it breakfast!) I had to pee again. This time it was 2 for the price of one! 2 stones came out... and I did it without any meds!
Again I felt proud... I wanted to take pictures of them, or even bring them home! Don't worry... I didn't!
Anyway, after a few short naps and a couple of hours of surfing facebook from my phone I was told I could go home at around 4:30. What a great feeling! I immediately called Tony, who was in a work golf tournament, to see if he could come get me. He said yes, but I could tell he didn't really want to leave the tourny. So I threw in a little guilt trip and called my dad to come get me instead. I mean seriously... your wife is in the hospital, pregnant with your baby, passing large, rough, spikey objects through tubes that are for fluid only, and you hesitate to leave your golf tournament?!! I'm sure most wives would have thrown a hissy fit about even going instead of sitting with them in the hospital. I thought I was being decent but just asking for a lift home!
Before anyone tells him how bad of a move that was, he did come and get me, and in record time. I find guilt works well with Tony ;)
Well, I am home now, and ready for bed. I can't wait to lay my head down on my own pillow!
Thanks for listening!!

Large and in charge!

27 weeks, 2 days big. I feel like a house. I can barely bend, I can barely breathe and I'm exhausted... with only 3 months left to go! I felt like this with the last 4 weeks of my pregnancy with Rylan, not the last 13!! It's going to be a long summer! Good thing we will have the pool... I will really, really enjoy feeling weightless all summer long!

So here is an interesting story... Rylan managed to dump an entire glass of ice cold water all over herself during dinner tonight. The funny part of this story, she was sitting on Tony's lap! So I stripped her down to her diaper and let her run around like that for a bit. After that she decided she would prefer to be without a diaper as well! I took a chance, and took it off. We took her to her potty just to show her that if she needed to go pee-pee the potty would be a good place to go. She sat down on it a couple of times and as she was getting up one of the times, she peed!! At least 2-3 drops landed ON (not in, but close enough!) the potty! We are so excited!! I'm sure it was just a fluke, but still... it's a start!

Here is something I learned today... don't go grocery shopping while craving chocolate! I didn't realize how much chocolate I bought until I got home and had to find somewhere to put it all! Chocolate covered raisins, turtles and drumsticks!! I can't wait to eat it all in record time!

Well peeps, I'm going to go spend some QT with Rylan before bedtime... have a great night!

Edited to add:

I forgot to mention my 1 hr. glucose test I had last week. I woke up on the Wednesday morning of my Dr's appointment and I wasn't sure if I needed to fast before the blood test or not. So just in case I was supposed to fast, I ate 2 giant Rice Krispy Squares before I left! I got a call tonight saying I passed! Yay pancreas, keep up the good work!
I also start seeing my OB this week. I had to switch from the Dr. that delivered Rylan because he moved to Montreal. So I am going to the same OB that my friends Cara and Michelle went to. I can't wait!
Ok, back to my quality time with Rowdy Ry!