A very Merry Christmas
from our family to yours!
Wednesday, December 25, 2019
Monday, December 23, 2019
Over half way there!
This pregnancy seems to have both flown by and then also parts seem to be dragging on! We did find out the gender (early actually due to some blood work suggested by my OB), and we are excited to welcome a little baby Boy to the mix next year!
I will be 21 weeks pregnant tomorrow and since my doctor plans to deliver at 38 weeks, that means I have 17 weeks left to go. I have begun to feel the little flutters and kicks, which makes this pregnancy all the more real. Until you can feel the baby, I always have a hard time believing they are really in there (any other moms deal with this?). At our 20 week ultrasound the Tech confirmed that he was indeed a boy, so we are excited that the blood work and gender ultrasound both confirm things. Baby boy is looking good and is measuring 5 days ahead of schedule (and weighing in at 13 ounces already), which for a mom that delivered her last baby early, is a great thing! Any additional growth we can get (within normal range) is awesome!
Because of my high risk status, I had to do an early glucose test and that came back negative, but I will have another one around 28-32 weeks just to confirm things are still fine with my blood sugar. My BP numbers remain good and I have actually gone down from 400 MG labetalol to 200 MG daily. You are allowed to go up to 2400 MG daily, so I have lots of wiggle room there if needed. We have been told repeatedly that my BP numbers would likely drop in my second trimester than slowly creep up in the third, so we are preparing for that anyway. But at my risk factor, my doctor will actually let me numbers get up in the 150s/90s before considering upping my meds. They let people with "Chronic hypertension" run a little higher than most because the baby is conceived in an environment with fluctuating numbers anyway and it actually puts them more at risk to medicate too much and let the numbers drop too low.
Also because of being high risk, I get to do ultrasounds every 4 weeks, so we go back in mid-January for another one. With Olivia, I had low amniotic fluid levels, along with the preeclampsia, and her distress in womb near the end, so they can monitor all of babies activity and fluid levels via the ultrasound. Plus I will take every opportunity I can to see the little guy!
The nausea/morning sickness from my earlier post continues and at my 20 weeks appointment, my doctor confirmed what I already suspected, that if you are still dealing with it at 20 weeks, it will likely stick around your whole pregnancy. I have no idea what causes it (foods, etc), but for awhile I was vomiting daily. Thankfully, it seems to be lessen a little (every other day or every third day), so I will take the streaks when I can get them, though the nausea and food aversions persists. As such, at almost 21 weeks pregnant, I am actually 3 pounds less than I was before I got pregnant, so though the bump continues to grow, the scale does not reflect that. Thankfully, my doctor is not overly concerned as I am not purposefully withholding calories (haha who does she think I am???) and the baby's growth is going just fine. A women's body is an amazing thing of nature to be able to provide for such a little one even when my nourishment is down.
People often asks if Olivia knows what is going on, and to be honest, we aren't sure. We tell her almost daily about her baby brother and she will sometimes offer a kiss to my belly. Her new thing is to ask me to "Open" my belly, meaning pull down my jeans so she can see my belly. I have tried to show her ultrasound pictures of the little guy, but they seem to scare her rather than impress her. And I imagine we could take her to the ultrasound with us, but that seems like a disaster to try. I know she would want to touch everything and the 45-60 minute appointment might be a little much to try to entertain her. So we continue to hope that she will adjust relatively well (though she does seem to be possessive of mom when other babies are around).
So for now, we just continue on the course and hope to make it to 38 weeks with no issues! We certainly appreciate those who pray with us for a much smoother pregnancy this time around and for a healthy baby boy!
Monday, November 18, 2019
2 years old!!!
It is hard to believe that our little baby girl is TWO! I always seem to find that parenthood is like a black hole, it seems we jumped in and now its two years later, but at the same time it is hard to remember life before kids. Our lives are so filled with this little bundle of joy that it is hard to imagine life without her. Although, I do seem to remember a lot more sleep and energy before I had a high energy toddler that let me know what real energy was.
Olivia is a doll like 90% of the time and a terror the other 10%. It is amazing how quickly her attitude can change and it scares me a little bit a lot about what the terrible twos or terrorist threes may look like.
She has simultaneously become more lovable and snugly and also more defiant and opinionated. She is obsessed with airplanes and helicopters, baby dolls, and puppies and kitties. We enjoy nightly walks where she is quick to point out the sounds of airplanes and can spot a puppy from a mile away (I think she gets this one from her mom).
Since my last update, she continues to grow and mature and it has been fun to see. She has moved into the 2 year old class at daycare, a class she will get to stay in for almost a year and has become quite the teacher's pet to at least one of her teachers. Miss Dorian (or REN as Olivia calls her), will regularly put down or move other kids when Olivia comes in so she can snuggle her. Both Olivia and Miss Dorian share a mutual love for cats, so it is no wonder they are fast friends. We are so very thankful for great teachers to date, but Miss Dorian has an extra special place in Olivia's heart.
Olivia is now regularly using two and three word "sentences" and it is fun to be able to communicate more and more with her. Her words have surpassed the 50 word mark so I stopped keeping track, but she is quick to repeat words, so Mommy and Daddy have to watch what we say around her! Our current favorite is when she says "Thank you, Mommy" or "Thank you, Daddy"
Olivia is now regularly using two and three word "sentences" and it is fun to be able to communicate more and more with her. Her words have surpassed the 50 word mark so I stopped keeping track, but she is quick to repeat words, so Mommy and Daddy have to watch what we say around her! Our current favorite is when she says "Thank you, Mommy" or "Thank you, Daddy"
A few highlights since her last update:
* We went to Tennessee to see my dad and a bunch of family, we also made a stop in Blacksburg
* Enjoyed the last days of our Busch Gardens pass with Tiffany and her kiddos
* Enjoyed the last days of our Busch Gardens pass with Tiffany and her kiddos
* We spent two weeks at Myrtle Beach where Olivia went from hating the ocean and sand to tolerating it by the end of the week, also, she survived her first hurricane!
* She had fall pictures at school and I snapped some at home!
* She went to the State Fair for her second year in a row
* She went to the State Fair for her second year in a row
* We enjoyed a reunion/play-date with some VT friends, where Olivia made her first trip to Uncle Andy's bar
* We went to the pumpkin patch!
* Her baby doll collection has grown from about 2 to probably 8 now (thanks grandparents!)
* Olivia has now developed the super human strength of 7 men when it is time to go in the car seat, she is like a ninja and will flip over in 1/2 a second so she doesn't have to be buckled in. I am always slightly amazed while simultaneously being completely annoyed. Moms, any tips?
* She was the star of Halloween, as many of our neighbors had special treats just for Olivia (yes, she is super spoiled by our neighborhood), she even learned to say "trick-or-treat" by the end of the night
* And most notably, she has been promoted to BIG SISTER!
I think it is no coincidence that she was born just the day after World Prematurity Day, so it is a constant reminder where she started and where she is now. I say it all the time, but all babies are miracles but Olivia was a special kind of miracle. When I see other moms that are still struggling with feeding tubes, breathing issues, and other linger effects of NICU life, it continually reminds me of just how blessed we have been with Olivia's success and I do not take it for granted! Our precious baby has truly become a little lady and we could not be happier about it!
* Olivia has now developed the super human strength of 7 men when it is time to go in the car seat, she is like a ninja and will flip over in 1/2 a second so she doesn't have to be buckled in. I am always slightly amazed while simultaneously being completely annoyed. Moms, any tips?
* She was the star of Halloween, as many of our neighbors had special treats just for Olivia (yes, she is super spoiled by our neighborhood), she even learned to say "trick-or-treat" by the end of the night
* And most notably, she has been promoted to BIG SISTER!
I think it is no coincidence that she was born just the day after World Prematurity Day, so it is a constant reminder where she started and where she is now. I say it all the time, but all babies are miracles but Olivia was a special kind of miracle. When I see other moms that are still struggling with feeding tubes, breathing issues, and other linger effects of NICU life, it continually reminds me of just how blessed we have been with Olivia's success and I do not take it for granted! Our precious baby has truly become a little lady and we could not be happier about it!
Friday, November 15, 2019
BIG NEWS
It has been awhile since my last post but that is for good reason, as we have some exciting news to share! Olivia has been officially promoted to BIG SISTER, with a new baby arriving *hopefully* late April 2020.
We all may remember the Christmas card I sent out in December 2017 which stated Baby Schinkel would arrive in February 2018 and then I had to pair that with a birth announcement because she came early! Let's not make that mistake again! We would not change a thing if it meant sweet Olivia would not be in our life, but her grand entrance certainly took us by surprise. So we are cautiously optimistic this baby will cook a bit longer!
So far this pregnancy has been much harder than my pregnancy with Olivia. I am now 15.5 weeks along and still dealing with nausea and vomiting regularly. "Morning sickness," they say, does the morning extend to 5pm? I am always super amused by the stories of people that did not know they were pregnant cause for both pregnancies, the morning sickness has started like clock-work at 6 weeks and with Olivia it was just nausea (thankfully) but it went on until around 24 weeks. I am hopeful this one will stop a bit earlier. Cause let me tell you, being sick with a high energy toddler and a full time job is not my equation for success. Poor, sweet Marc has been a great support, picking up my slack and being an all around supportive dad and hubby!
As far as the risk of preeclampsia striking again? Well to be blunt, we are not sure! Most of the time, preeclampsia is thought of as a "first pregnancy" disorder, but if you had it with your first, you are at an elevated risk of developing it again, especially if you delivered very early and had it severe (which both were the case for me). The good news is that some people go on to have relatively healthy pregnancies, and those that do develop it, generally develop it later and milder. We hope for the former, but will take the later if necessary. Either way, my doctors have already said they will deliver me at 38 weeks, no matter what, so although baby's due date is May 6th, we know it will be more like April 22 or so when we meet this sweet baby.
We are taking every precaution in the book so have hope for a much better pregnancy. I have been started on a once daily low-dose aspirin (the only thing proven to prevent preeclampsia, though it only helps about 5% of the time), and am monitoring my blood pressure regularly. I am also being followed by both my OB and a perinatalogist (a high risk maternal doctor). So we are in good hands. Overall, we are told, my likelihood of developing preeclampsia again is somewhere between 15-25%. Needless to say, we will be more prepared this time around (likely taking a hospital bag to appointments as we get further along, so I don't end up like last time).
But enough with the technical talk, this baby will certainly be a blessing to our family and Olivia has been practicing her big sister skills with her plethora of baby dolls. I just know she will take her role seriously. We appreciate all the prayers and hopes for a successful pregnancy this time around, as we add this little pumpkin to our family!
We all may remember the Christmas card I sent out in December 2017 which stated Baby Schinkel would arrive in February 2018 and then I had to pair that with a birth announcement because she came early! Let's not make that mistake again! We would not change a thing if it meant sweet Olivia would not be in our life, but her grand entrance certainly took us by surprise. So we are cautiously optimistic this baby will cook a bit longer!
So far this pregnancy has been much harder than my pregnancy with Olivia. I am now 15.5 weeks along and still dealing with nausea and vomiting regularly. "Morning sickness," they say, does the morning extend to 5pm? I am always super amused by the stories of people that did not know they were pregnant cause for both pregnancies, the morning sickness has started like clock-work at 6 weeks and with Olivia it was just nausea (thankfully) but it went on until around 24 weeks. I am hopeful this one will stop a bit earlier. Cause let me tell you, being sick with a high energy toddler and a full time job is not my equation for success. Poor, sweet Marc has been a great support, picking up my slack and being an all around supportive dad and hubby!
As far as the risk of preeclampsia striking again? Well to be blunt, we are not sure! Most of the time, preeclampsia is thought of as a "first pregnancy" disorder, but if you had it with your first, you are at an elevated risk of developing it again, especially if you delivered very early and had it severe (which both were the case for me). The good news is that some people go on to have relatively healthy pregnancies, and those that do develop it, generally develop it later and milder. We hope for the former, but will take the later if necessary. Either way, my doctors have already said they will deliver me at 38 weeks, no matter what, so although baby's due date is May 6th, we know it will be more like April 22 or so when we meet this sweet baby.
We are taking every precaution in the book so have hope for a much better pregnancy. I have been started on a once daily low-dose aspirin (the only thing proven to prevent preeclampsia, though it only helps about 5% of the time), and am monitoring my blood pressure regularly. I am also being followed by both my OB and a perinatalogist (a high risk maternal doctor). So we are in good hands. Overall, we are told, my likelihood of developing preeclampsia again is somewhere between 15-25%. Needless to say, we will be more prepared this time around (likely taking a hospital bag to appointments as we get further along, so I don't end up like last time).
But enough with the technical talk, this baby will certainly be a blessing to our family and Olivia has been practicing her big sister skills with her plethora of baby dolls. I just know she will take her role seriously. We appreciate all the prayers and hopes for a successful pregnancy this time around, as we add this little pumpkin to our family!
Thursday, August 8, 2019
Olivia at 20ish months and exciting news for her!
Since its been a little over two months since my last update on Olivia, I thought it might be time for another update! Our sweet little baby girl has in fact no baby left in her, she is now for sure full on toddler! And in less than 4 months she will be TWO! Seriously, how? Olivia is running, climbing, and is actually quite hard to keep up with these days! In the past few months, she has FINALLY mastered the art of sleep! And we are forever thankful. If she could just teach our dogs, now that would be something of a miracle.
This summer has been spent:
* Going to Busch Gardens, the pool, and the zoo
* Enjoying eating strawberries and peaches
* Enjoying cat snuggles
* Hating our car seat and not getting our way
* Spending time with family* Sporting a new ponytail
* Spending as much time outside as possible
* Taking part in Home Depot Kids Club
* And generally being cute!
She has now traded her first morning word from kitty to Daddy and is always looking out for her daddy. She adds almost daily to her inventory of words, lets see how many I can count:
Olivia can (though she doesn't always prefer to) follow directions! She has certainly gotten a more defiant streak in her since the last update and "No" has become a much more common word in her vocabulary. I guess we should be lucky it took her this long to figure out she has a say (somewhat). She has also become very vocal about being "finished" with the car seat even after just 15 minutes or so. So our upcoming 7 hour car ride to Tennessee should be fun!
As far as daycare, Olivia continues to do well with it, we have some days where she cries when mommy tries to leave but more often than not, she is fine! Her teachers all say that Olivia now "rules the class" and apparently she has them trained well as one of her teachers told me one day, Olivia was so tired I didn't have to rub her back to get her to fall asleep. I said Olivia does not get that kind of treatment at home so I think she has been playing you all :) Apparently her desire for back rubs comes straight from her dad!
She is very comfortable around regular visitors and will still cling to mom and dad around strangers, but if she spend a day or two with you, she is more comfortable. She is a very pleasant little girl to be around, she makes everyone smile and laugh and her personality is amazing! We feel so lucky to call her our daughter!
She is still obsessed with balls and her pacifier and more recently babies! I think this might have to do with the birth of our newest nephew (her newest cousin), Stanley! Every time she sees a picture of him, she says baby! It is fun to show her pictures and videos of her as a baby and try to convince her that that is Olivia, her response, no, baby! Another fun adventure with meeting her new cousin, was that we got to make a quick stop in the NICU to see her old nurse. I have so enjoyed documenting her growth next to her NICU nurse and its fun to see Olivia now (left) versus her day of discharge at 2 months old (right).
And if you have hung on this long, some exciting news! Olivia officially graduated from the NICU continued care clinic for Developmental and Special Needs. We have been very blessed to be followed by this clinic for our journey. They have all the specialists on staff there (OT, PT, Speech, Pediatrician, and sometimes a pediatric dentist) and each one comes in for about 15 minutes to assess your child and see where they are hitting based on various tests they preform and questions they ask mom and dad. At our July appointment (her 18 months adjusted age), Olivia was aging exactly with her actual age of 20 months, so she was given a sweet book and discharged from all services. It has been 20 months of extra doctors and specialist and we can finally say we are done! No more PT finally after almost a year of services!!! We could not be prouder for our sweet little girl!
This summer has been spent:
* Going to Busch Gardens, the pool, and the zoo
* Enjoying eating strawberries and peaches
* Enjoying cat snuggles
* Hating our car seat and not getting our way
* Spending time with family* Sporting a new ponytail
* Spending as much time outside as possible
* Taking part in Home Depot Kids Club
* And generally being cute!
She has now traded her first morning word from kitty to Daddy and is always looking out for her daddy. She adds almost daily to her inventory of words, lets see how many I can count:
Daddy, Mommy, Kitty, Puppy, Meow, Thank you, blueberry, Night, Yeah, Banana, Ball, More, Yes, No, Bye, Mwah (for kiss), Nannie, Oma, Hi, Boobie, Juice, Mmmmm, Cheese, head, ear, happy, baby, bubble, BoBo (our neighbor's dog), Brutus, Brando, Hot, water, tea, newman (Our neighbors cat), Gigi, pink, fishie, hello, and she says a number of animal sounds (Moo, Baaa, Neigh, Meow). I am sure there are more words but that is what we could come up with. So she now has 40+ words in her vocabulary and at our 18 month NICU follow up (more on that below), the speech therapist said once she gets about 40-50 words, we should see her start to string two of them together to make sentences like "More strawberries" or "No Milk" so we are anxiously waiting every day for that fun!
As far as daycare, Olivia continues to do well with it, we have some days where she cries when mommy tries to leave but more often than not, she is fine! Her teachers all say that Olivia now "rules the class" and apparently she has them trained well as one of her teachers told me one day, Olivia was so tired I didn't have to rub her back to get her to fall asleep. I said Olivia does not get that kind of treatment at home so I think she has been playing you all :) Apparently her desire for back rubs comes straight from her dad!
She is very comfortable around regular visitors and will still cling to mom and dad around strangers, but if she spend a day or two with you, she is more comfortable. She is a very pleasant little girl to be around, she makes everyone smile and laugh and her personality is amazing! We feel so lucky to call her our daughter!
She is still obsessed with balls and her pacifier and more recently babies! I think this might have to do with the birth of our newest nephew (her newest cousin), Stanley! Every time she sees a picture of him, she says baby! It is fun to show her pictures and videos of her as a baby and try to convince her that that is Olivia, her response, no, baby! Another fun adventure with meeting her new cousin, was that we got to make a quick stop in the NICU to see her old nurse. I have so enjoyed documenting her growth next to her NICU nurse and its fun to see Olivia now (left) versus her day of discharge at 2 months old (right).
And if you have hung on this long, some exciting news! Olivia officially graduated from the NICU continued care clinic for Developmental and Special Needs. We have been very blessed to be followed by this clinic for our journey. They have all the specialists on staff there (OT, PT, Speech, Pediatrician, and sometimes a pediatric dentist) and each one comes in for about 15 minutes to assess your child and see where they are hitting based on various tests they preform and questions they ask mom and dad. At our July appointment (her 18 months adjusted age), Olivia was aging exactly with her actual age of 20 months, so she was given a sweet book and discharged from all services. It has been 20 months of extra doctors and specialist and we can finally say we are done! No more PT finally after almost a year of services!!! We could not be prouder for our sweet little girl!
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