Big Update!

Cletus the Fetus is no more! Our baby boy was born on Wednesday at 1:47 pm by c-section. He was 5 lbs 13 oz, 18 1/4 inches in length, and head circumference of 13 inches. The birth was precipitated by bleeding, caused by a combination of placenta previa and severe nausea. While we were hoping to get another 12 days of bed rest, I am happy to report the birth went very smoothly.

The name of our son is Wesley Martin. Wesley is a family name - he was a dear cousin to my husband. Martin was my father's name. Both of these fine men are no longer with us, and we wanted to honor them by naming our son after them. Many folks guessed at the names, especially on my husband's side. We still enjoyed keeping it secret, sorry! To tell the full truth, we had baby names picked out years before we ever conceived.

I'll update the blog later to reflect on the birth, which was a positive experience, and tell you about how Baby Wesley is doing. For now I'd like to say he is a premie, but he's doing very well. He needs to learn how to 'feed' before he can come home from the hospital. So we're working on his growth in the NICU by feeding him donated breast milk and I am supplementing that with any colostrum or breast milk I can produce by pumping. He gets sleepy during feeds, or he gets a little uncoordinated. They call level 2 NICU the 'growers and feeders' so that's exactly what he needs to do before he comes home! I get to go home tomorrow, but will be over at the hospital daily to spend time with Wesley.

Insomnia.

Clam shell here! Little Cletus is as happy as a clam. He moves around, he gives me strong kicks, his heartbeat is always strong on the NST monitors. That makes me the clam shell, of course. (Cute nickname courtesy of my dear aunt.) I watched him kick my abdomen a few times this evening. Then he disappeared when I poked at my belly. Oh, you can run kiddo and you can certainly try and hide, but your jig will soon be up. You'll be swaddled nicely in a few weeks and then we'll see how much you can kick me from the Babby Burrito!

When you're in bed or reclined much of the time, it's difficult to to find yourself tired and ready for bed. I've turned off the TV and played all of my Words with Friends games. It's time to wind-down. So I thought I'd give an update. I slept extremely well last night, with the help of exhaustion and some benadryl. The night before - not so much. I think I fell alseep around 4 am and then snoozed on and off for most of the morning. My doctor was pretty reasonable - so long as I get enough sleep, he doesn't want me to worry about when I get it.

The advice I've seen again and again re: bed rest is to set up a routine. I suck at routines. (That's why an insulin pump works so well for me; it gives a lot of flexibility.) I have two weeks to go and I'm not going to sweat it. Clock watching doesn't help insomnia.  Fortunately now I'm feeling pretty sleepy. Something else helped for the past few nights - a heating pad. Oh, it was lovely on my back and kept me toasty warm. Hospitals have some really cool gadgets, and the water-filled heating pads, or 'K-packs', are pretty magical. They get warm quickly and stay nice and warm. This balances out with the really iffy HVAC system, that's always blowing around air and usually warm if I want cool or cool if I want warm. I gave up on the thermostat. Messing with the dial took it from Cool to ICE or from Warm to ZOMGTROPICS.

Two weeks to the evacuation date! And now Cletus is kicking me again. See what I get for taunting the boy? He's so advanced, he can read unpublished blog pages. ;)

You'll have to ask Future-Dad about his adventures in the Infant-Care class he took on Saturday. He did have someone there for moral support, since I couldn't attend. It sounds like it was a very informative course, and I've been reading the book - it's quite good. Maybe I'll get a few more pages in and then find some zzz's.

Halloween!

Cletus' Mom here, writing from the hospital. No medical news to report. The c-section is scheduled and we're working to make it to week 36.

Halloween was a lot of fun. My Mom asked me if the kids in the hospital were allowed to trick or treat, and I was dubious at first. (Germs and all of that.) But I heard from the nurses that sometimes kids of the staff will come around in costume, so I rethought my Mom's idea of handing out treats. She brought over some decorations from the dollar store, and my siblings put them up for me. I received a lot of compliments, particularly the spooky spider hanging from the doorway. My friends came by on the 30th in costume and we knitted and celebrated! Halloween itself was fun - kids did come knocking due to my 'Trick or Treaters Welcome' sign, and I had a lot of candy folks brought over to hand out, and my good friends J&E to keep me company.

My favorites of the weekend - My friend made a Nerd Herd uniform from the TV show Chuck, complete with lanyard and name badge. SO CREATIVE! And the Star Wars family - Momma Leia, Darth Vader, and a diminutive Yoda. I wish I'd thought to take photos! My niece and nephew looked awesome, and came by with their parents to visit. My niece thought the make up was itchy but she made a great kitty cat with just enough spooky. My nephew is two, and as Batman really had the hang of this trick or treat thing. He was walking up to every adult in my room to ask for help with opening his candy!