Finding a New Normal

Oh my goodness the last few weeks have just flown by

Its been the most beautiful and tiring string of days and nights that are all blurred together 

The boys are absolutely smitten with Jonas. 

They ask to hold him and feed him and bathe him a hundred times a day.  They talk to him and try to soothe him when he cries. 

They run over to check on him when I rock him  

And try as hard as they can to be quiet when he is sleeping 

I am so tired and so happy 

I have to keep reminding myself that this time doesn't last.  That the dishes and laundry not getting done isn't the end of the world, because eventually, he will get bigger, eat more and sleep longer and then I will get more sleep and we can fall into a routine and find our new normal. 

Brad keeps reminding me to just try to enjoy it.  That it is stressful, but exciting and fun and that we will miss it once its over. 

Our little angel is already changing so much 

He is getting rounder and eats as much as 4 oz in one feeding and he has definitely found his voice.  I am pretty sure the neighbors across the street can hear this buddy when I change his diaper. 

He loved his first bath.  That is until we had to unwrap the bandage from his little peep from his circumcision the day before.  So sad, I could cry again just thinking about it. 

We are working on the sleeping thing.  Some days I have more energy and stay on top of sleep training him, other days Im exhausted and just give in and hold him all day and all night. 

We had our first family outing.  We had to go to Reno so he could get his second PKU and made a day of and went to lunch and took the boys to a movie.  It was so nice to get out of the house and Jonas was the sweetest the whole day.  We just had to feed him in the car before we headed back home. 

His little stump fell off his belly button and that was disgusting!  I always rejoice on that day, cause those things are nasty!!  His tummy is all cuteness now. 

So with that gone, he is 100% cute and perfect and amazing 

I mean look at that face!  I can't get over him. 

Brad snapped this picture one evening and it makes me laugh.  I look tired for sure, and some days are definitely how this picture looks, but even the tired days are full of wonderfullness.  My boys complete me!  All 4 of them :) 

Our First Week

The first week after having a baby is just so amazing and weird.  haha  I was so happy that Brad was able to take a couple of days off of work and just be home.  We've never had that before, cause with the other two boys, he was in school and was back in class the very next day.  

We just spent the days laying around snuggling our new buddy and loving every minute of it. 

I can't handle it when Brad holds him!  It makes my heart melt everytime. 

The week was so relaxing and wonderful and Brads Mom is 100 % the reason for that!  I really cannot even begin to explain how amazing it was having Brads parents with us.  They did SO MUCH!!  Not only was it great having them there just because we have missed them so much and because it was such a relief to know that the boys were happy and taken care of through everything, but they just did so much.  They raked leaves, pulled weeds, and swept off the patio, sanded down the doors that stick in the hallway, went grocery shopping, made us amazing meals everyday, cleaned the entire house, unpacked boxes, even did some electrical work that needed to be done.  They took the baby when I needed to eat or shower or sleep.  I could go on and on and on.  Our first morning back home, I may have cried when I opened up my dresser drawer to find all clean clothes, folded and put away.  I love my inlaws so much and if I ever have another baby again, I can tell you right now, I will not be doing it without them.  They made everything so much easier and so much better and I just love them.  We will never be able to thank them enough! 

Jonas loves to be held.  I know all babies do, but this kid, especially the first few weeks, refused to sleep unless he was being held.  I must say, it didnt bother me too much this first week. 

He loves to nurse!  My other boys were more take-it-or-leave-it, but Jonas seems to prefer it to a bottle.  He takes a bottle just fine, but loves to nurse.  And I have always had some hormonal problems when it comes to breastfeeding.  Especially with Kalvin.  All that wonderful post-pardom, baby blues, mommy anxiety that I never had a problem with would always hit me like a freight train the moment the baby would latch, so it was always really, really hard to keep up on the breastfeeding.  But so far, this time around has been great.  He loves it, I am fine with it, I am producing more than I ever have before, so its really good. 

And I had horrible afterbirth pains.  I have never talked to anyone outside of my family who gets these, so it makes me feel like a crazy person, but I get a lot of cramping and contractions after I have the baby.  It sucks bad.  And I don't know what it is, but I swear this time around, holding the baby would make them not be as bad.  It was probably just because holding him makes me happy and reminds me that the pain is worth having him, so I can deal with it better, but I am telling you, it worked for me.

Brad gave me this beautiful bouquet of flowers a couple days after Jonas was born and I love them!  He always has a hard time buying flowers, because to him it seems like a dumb gift, because it only lasts like a week or two and then its gone, so he prefers to do other gifts.  More practical gifts. So whenever he buys me flowers, its a big deal.  haha  It just goes against his grain, but he knows that I love it, so when he buys them for me, I know that its purely because he loves me.  He keeps telling me how proud he is of me and I love it :)  Truth be told, there is no way that I would have been able to get through any of it without him.  He saved me every awful day of my pregnancy and he saved me when I was sure I couldn't have this baby naturally.  And he definately saves me every moment I am exhausted by having 3 beautiful, but crazy boys.

Bringing Jonas Home

Leaving the hospital was the best feeling ever.  In fact, I felt so good, I refused to sit in the stupid wheel chair and just walked myself right out.  We buckled our little sweetie in the back and we were off.  I told Brad that we HAD to stop for food.  I was SO hungry and its like hospitals don't want you to eat.  So we stopped at BJ's and we had a few people come up and ask how old the baby was and when we told them '1 day' they looked at us like we were crazy.  But I wasn't going another hour and a half without eating.

We got home just as it was getting dark to a clean house and balloons and two excited boys and two just as excited Grandparents! 

And I am not even exaggerating when I say that seeing Clark and Kal meet Jonas made my life complete. 

Kalvin could not contain his excitement.  He has been so overjoyed about this baby since the beginning of my pregnancy. 

So in love with this 

Clark was excited, but a little more reserved about the whole thing, like always.   

He kept wanting to touch his head and little hands and feet.  It was so sweet to watch him take it all in.  When he met Kal, he was just a baby himself, so it was awesome seeing him be so much more aware of what was going on and be excited for it. 

And Grandma and Grandpa got some good time in with the baby too. 

Funny side not:  when we texted Brad's parents the baby's picture and name, Dad thought that we had named the baby "Jones".  haha 

Oh we were so so happy to be home in our own bed with all our little boys under one roof.  And food too. 

Jonas Evert Robison

The last two weeks of my pregnancy were the most painful two weeks ever.  I started having lots and lots of contractions.  They never progressed enough to make me think I was in labor, just enough to make me hurt all the time.  Being up on my feet is what would make them start up, so I tried to stay off of my feet, but inevitably at the end of each day, they would start up, cause I had to get up to answer the door or change Kal or pee, etc.  So I would lay on the couch wanting to die each night.  But even worse than that was that the baby had dropped so much that my pelvic ligaments shifted and started to separate and it hurt SO crazy bad.  I have never had that happen before and it was miserable.  Normally I wouldnt have posted the above photo, because its awful, but this is what those two weeks looked like.  I really couldnt walk without crying, it hurt so bad.  I had to hold my belly and tried to just slide my feet along the floor, so I wasn't moving too much and hold onto walls and furniture to take some of the pressure off.  It was pretty pathetic.

So when we went in for my 38 week doctors appointment, I was so ready for him to tell me that the baby was coming.  Just walking into the office was enough to start some fantastic contractions that made me feel so dumb sitting in the waiting room.  They called me back and as the nurse watched me barely make it across the room to her, she just looked at me and said, "Um are you in labor?"  haha  I told her that I hoped that the doctor would tell me that I was.  So Dr. Jack came in, did an ultrasound to make sure the baby was in the right position, and then he examined me and said that I was still only dilated to 2 cm.  We talked lots and he said that he felt like I should be induced the following Sunday if the baby didn't come sooner.  And as much as I had been fighting him on being induced the months prior, I felt the same.  So I agreed.

I was frustrated that I still wasn't in labor and that I was hurting so much, so I told Brad that I was just going to push through the pain and induce labor myself.  So we went straight from the doctor to Target to do some shopping.  I walked around Target for 30 minutes and thought that I was going to die.  It was awful.  By the time we got to the checkout stand, I said I was done and going to wait in the car.  So I left... and got to the car the exact same time as Brad and the boys.  He waited in line, purchased all our crap, took Clark to the bathroom, walked all the way through the parking lot, all in the time in took me to get to the car.  That's how slow I was.  Oh my gosh it was so sad.

So Brad called his parents to let them know how I was doing and seeing as how I could go into labor at any moment and couldn't hardly move in the meantime, they decided that they were coming up.  So a couple days later, they drove up and took over everything.  And it was amazing!  I had been feeling so stressed about not being able to do anything and the house not being clean and not being able to be there for the kids like I wanted to be and Brad was doing so much, I was so worried about him being so burned out and all of us just being exhausted and done before the baby even got here.  But as soon as Brads parents walked in the door, I felt like I could breathe.  They took care of the kids, made dinners, did chores, basically just made everything wonderful and stress-free while we awaited labor.

The weekend rolled around and still no baby.  I ate spicy food and pineapple and since I couldn't walk at all, Brad took me on a bumpy ride through the hills.  Saturday night while we were all watching a movie, those contractions started in hard.  They were the hardest so far and we almost thought that we would need to go in to the hospital, but like always, they died off after a couple hours.

Sunday morning I woke up anxious and worried.  I felt like things weren't going to go as easily as I was hoping.  I felt like it was going to be a really hard labor and a really hard recovery.  I just felt anxious.  About an hour before we left, Brad gave me a blessing and I was able to feel at peace.  He didn't bless me that things would go easily, but that my body would work properly and that I would be strong enough to handle what was coming.  And I felt at peace with that.  We kissed the boys goodbye and got on the road to Reno.  On the way there we talked about names and then before I knew it we were pulling into the hospital parking garage.

We got checked in and they took us to our room and it was a huge room with a pretty view of the city and a bed for Brad.  I loved our nurse that was with us all night.  She was so sweet.  And at the other hospitals where I delivered they would only let me have ice chips, not even water.  But this one, they said I could have water, juice, jello, popcicles, they even offered to get me an italian ice.  Pretty fancy ;) They got things started and said that it would probably take me through the night to progress to 10 cm.  So we just relaxed and tried to sleep.  I was still only 2 cm when we got there at 8pm and with the stuff they gave me, it took me til about 3am to dilate to 4 cm.  Thats about when my water broke.  I woke Brad up and told him and then  he went back to sleep and I tried, but the contractions were making it impossible.   

I got my epidural at like 6am and I was SO ready for it.  I'd been dreaming of that thing through weeks of pain.  So the anesthesiologist came in and stuck that giant needle in my back, and this awful pain shot down my right leg and it felt totally different than my other two epidurals.  I told the anesthesiologist and he just said that it was normal.  So I laid back and felt my body start to get all warm and numb and it was wonderful and I was just so happy!  I told Brad to go get some breakfast and that I was going to sleep.  I woke up a little while later when the nurse came in to check on things and I realized that my right leg was completely numb, but that I could totally feel all of my left leg.  I told the nurse and she just told me to push the little button to get another dose of medicine.  I did and felt nothing.  So as the contractions started getting harder and started coming a lot faster, I told the nurse to get the anesthesiologist back in there.  He finally came back, gave me another shot and told me to give it 20 minutes.  So for those 20 minutes I laid there and felt all that wonderful numbness fade away and all the pain wash over me.  I felt EVERYTHING.  The anesthesiologist came in again and gave me another shot, but I knew it wasn't going to work.  

I sorta lost track of time after that.  I have no idea how long it was before the nurse came in and said that I was 10 cm and having the baby like right now and that there was no time to redo the epidural.  The doctor rushed in, they got everything set up,people were talking to me, but I was in so much pain I couldn't respond or talk or look up or anything.  I was just hugging Brad and listening to him tell me that I could do it.  

So finally it was time to push.  Finally.  It was the most intense, horrible feeling in the entire world.  I really can't believe that that is what having a baby feels like.  I was crying and clinging to Brad.  My head was screaming, but I am not sure if I was actually screaming out loud.  Really, no idea.  It was so weird and such a relief, feeling the baby actually be born.  It was crazy!  The whole thing was crazy!  All those women who choose to do natural birth are crazy!  That hurt so bad, I still can't believe it.

But then they laid this perfect little baby on my chest and he was screaming and kicking and I just couldn't believe how much I loved him and how worth it all the pain was. 

All those weeks of feeling like I was going to die from morning sickness.  All the braxton-hicks, all the hormone headaches, all the mood swings, all the pelvic and back pain, not being able to move or walk, all the terribleness that is natural birth, all of it, completely worth it. 

He was 6 lbs and 13 oz and they said that he measured at 21 inches, but at his two week appointment they measured him at 19 inches, so I don't know. 

Is that not the most beautiful face!?  Oh we still can't stop staring at it.  We had a few names that we were considering, but I had felt, since my 4th month of pregnancy, that his name was Jonas.  We just really loved that name a lot.  Plus, one of the meanings of Jonas is, 'he who destroys' and after that pregnancy and delivery, it just seemed fitting ;)  We gave him the middle name, Evert, after my Grandpa Merkley, one of the greatest men I know. 

We hung out for a while before they could move us to recovery.  I felt so strange, because my body was completely and totally exhausted, but I still had quite a bit of adrenaline pumping through my veins, so I was wide awake.  So tired and not tired at all, all at the same time,  It was super weird.  So we got to calling and texting and taking pictures and just squeezing and cuddling little Jonas.

Anyone who has had a baby knows how scary it is to stand up that first time and I was really worried, because that was not a fun experience with my first two babies.  But this time, I stood up and was shocked, because although it hurt, it was such an improvement over how I had been feeling for the last few weeks.  It was awesome.  I was so relieved to be able to stand and walk with less pain.  Glass is half full, right?!

They moved us to recovery and I was SO happy to be getting into that more comfortable bed, even though the room was tiny and we had a lovely view of the roof.  I was starving and they brought me in the most disgusting looking dinner I have ever seen.  So, Brad said he would go get me dinner.  He was a little hesitant to leave me and the baby, but Jimmy Johns was worth it.  And that sandwich tasted as close to heaven as I think food can taste.

So we had a long night of being up with Jonas and the nurses and doctors coming in every few minutes, but it was amazing, as it always is, because we had the "new baby high" or whatever.     

The next morning we were just dying to get out of there.  But you know hospitals... they were taking their sweet time.  I informed every nurse that came in that we would not be staying another night and that we were ready to go.   A few seemed a little annoyed, but I mean really, who wants to stay in a cramped hospital room with people coming in every 10 minutes and you're trying to nurse the baby and there is no food.  We were ready!  

Plus I just couldnt wait to get home and see Clark and Kalvin's little faces when they met their new brother!!