The First Two Weeks

For the next 2 weeks, we pretty much stayed home and laid low. Since I had a scheduled c-section, we were able to stock up on groceries and most of what we would need to get through for a few weeks. My parents were in town for a few days after we got out of the hospital and they took me out to get the baby essentials that we would need to hunker down.

Most of my time was spent feeding Sam and trying to sleep when she slept. She had her nights and days mixed up so I spent most of the night awake feeding her and slept a lot during the day. Kirk took care of Sam when she wasn't eating and worked on some small projects around the house. We had friends over for a BBQ one night to celebrate my first beer in 9 months. For the record, the first beer was a special homebrew that Kirk had made called "Baby Wheat". He actually had just finished brewing it when we found out that I was pregnant so it had 9 months to ripen. It was awesome!

One of the big things we were worried about was introducing Sam to Rosco. He's our first baby and we didn't want to have to get rid of Sam if they didn't get along (j/k - please don't report me to child services...)

As you can see from these pictures, it wasn't a problem at all. Rosco loves his little sister! If she's crying, he stays right next to her and will lick her feet until mom or dad comes over to help her. When we take her into the nursery to change her diaper, he comes along and lays on the rug by the changing table to watch us. It really is the cutest thing ever!

This, however, is not the cutest thing ever. We call this Sam's "stink-face" which she likes to bust out right before a big yell. Kirk was a little worried when we first brought her home because she was such a quiet baby. He got over that quickly once she started to spend more time awake and make much, much more noise! Overall, she's still a pretty great baby and generally only cries when she's hungry, wet, tired or pooping/farting (which happens A LOT!)

Watching History

Gotta train her right (and by right, that means left!) We spent a lot of time watching TV during the first few weeks. I had forgotten how terrible daytime television is! Thank god the new fall shows were starting up and the two parties had their conventions going on.

Our Doula

As you may have seen previously in the blog, we had a doula, Marie, with us at Sam's birth. We met Marie through our "Prepared Childbirth" class - she was our instructor. After class one day, she volunteered to be our doula for FREE! I was a bit hestitant about having a doula at first since I am a pretty private person and couldn't imagine having anyone other than Kirk in the delivery room. But the more we got into our childbirth classes and the more determined I became to have a natural childbirth, the more I became convinced that it would be a good idea to have someone around to help Kirk. Plus, someone with a lot of knowledge about the birthing process and different pain relieving methods couldn't hurt either!

So we decided to have Marie as our doula and never regretted that decision. She was absolutely wonderful throughout the entire process. When we intially found out that Sam was breech, she came over and gave us some exercises and things to try to get her turned around. She came with us to the hospital when I had the procedure to try to turn Sam and was super supportive. She was unfazed when we had to have a c-section and explained to us her experience with c-sections (she used to be a labor and delivery nurse so she was full of information!) At my delivery, Marie was in the operating room with us and took all the pictures. It was amazing to have her there - and especially taking pictures - so that Kirk could actually be in the pictures!

Since Sam's birth, Marie has come over on a number of occassions to visit with us and check to make sure that we're doing okay. She has been a wonderful help and we can't thank her enough. For anyone out there considering hiring a doula, I would say DO IT!

Jaundice

Overall, our stay at the hospital was uneventful. The staff was great and we were well taken care of. They made me get out of bed about 12 hours after the surgery and start walking the halls to help heal from the surgery. It was ridiculously painful at first but got easier as time went on.


Sam's pediatrician came and checked on her every morning. Everything was going well until the morning we were being discharged from the hospital. Her bilirubin levels were rising and they started getting a little concerned. Bilirubin is created as your body breaks down red blood cells and is ordinarly filtered out by a properly functioning liver. When babies are born, their livers are not functioning at full capacity and it sometimes takes a couple of days to get up to speed. In the meantime, they often develop a certain degree of jaundice, or yellowing of the skin, as a result of the increased bilirubin levels in their bloodstream. It is more common in breastfed babies because they are not getting a large quantity of food until the mother's milk "come in" a few days after delivery.

The morning of our discharge, Sam's bilirubin level was on the low end of the range when they start getting concerned. They went ahead and discharged both me and Sam from the hospital but the pediatrician told us to watch her over the course of the day and call that night to see whether they would want us to go and get another test done. They told us to watch and see if she was lethargic because that is a sign of jaundice.

You can see in these pictures that her skin looks a little yellow. Sam did seem lethargic during the day (in retrospect, what 3 day old baby doesn't sleep a lot?) so we called around 4:00 that night and they told us to head back to the hospital for another blood test. Having to take your baby back to the hospital the day she was discharged was really discouraging. We checked in and registered with the Children's Hospital here in Chattanooga and had blood drawn. We decided to go home and wait for results (luckily the hospital is only about 5 minutes from our house). The pediatrician called 2 hours later and said that her levels were steady from that morning and asked us to come in the next day so that a doctor could see her in person. We felt a lot better since her levels had not risen but were still nervous.

We went to the pediatrician's office the next morning - after a long night of feeding her as much as possible - and he said that everything looked to be headed in the right direction. Sam had gained something like 6 ounces in 24 hours so it was clear that she was getting a lot of food! She was given the "all clear" for worries about jaundice and we were told to make an appointment for her one month checkup. First potential baby disaster averted!

Heading Home

We were discharged from the hospital on Monday morning. Kirk had to make 3-4 trip to the car with all of our stuff. It was my goal after the surgery to be able to walk myself to the car and I did it. It may have taken me 15 minutes, but I made it! Here's some pictures of Sam's first trip in the car and first pictures at home!

Hospital Stay

We stayed in the hospital over the weekend. It was overall uneventful. The staff was great and we were well taken care of. I had to get out of bed and walk the halls every few hours to help with recovery from the surgery. It was ridiculously painful at first but got better as time passed. Kirk stayed at the hospital we me the whole time - except for once when he had to run (literally, he ran home from the hospital) home to meet with our electrician. Leave it to us to have the last of our electrical work done while we were in the hospital with Sam. Nothing like leaving it until the last minute!










Sam slept most of the first couple of days - we had to wake her to try to get her to eat most of the time. We kept her in our room around the clock except for the few times that they took her to the nursery for check ups. If we were sleeping, they kept her in the nursery for a few hours - that was nice!










Aren't babies feet just the cutest things ever?



















We had a few visitors at the hospital. Some friends from my work stopped by with gifts. Our doula came to check on us to make sure that everything was going well (she was the best!) My parents came to visit a few times and brought a beautiful bouquet of flowers. Kirk's sister April and her family also sent us a gorgeous flower arrangement.


Overall, our hospital stay was as good as could be expected - though they really need to work on the food! Kirk ran (again literally) out and got us McDonalds once because we just couldn't take it anymore.

Naming the baby

Our poor child was known as "Baby girl Hubbard" for a whole day! Although we were pretty sure that we had a girl's name that we liked even prior to delivery, we wanted to make sure that the name fit the baby so we waited overnight to be certain. In the morning we let everyone know that we had decided to name her Samantha Lee Hubbard. We liked Samantha because it has so many cute nicknames. We now call her Sam, Samo or Sambo (among other less kind names...) The middle name Lee has special significance for both side of our family. On the Hughes side, Lee is both my and my mother's middle name (Jamie Lee and Sharon Lee). On the Hubbard side, Lee is Kirk's dad's and his oldest brother's middle name (Harry Lee and Eric Lee). So the middle name was easy regardless of whether the baby was a boy or a girl!

It all begins...

Due to the baby being breach, we had scheduled a c-section for noon on August 15. We checked into the hospital around 10:00 am to get ready. Kirk and I passed the time by reading names from our "25,000 baby names" book, since we still didn't have a name if the baby turned out to be a boy. We were pretty sure about the girl's name but had nothing decided for a boy.




About 11:45, I walked over the operating room with the nurse and had my spinal block performed. They wouldn't allow anyone else in the room while that was happening. Kirk was brought in after I was numb and laying on the operating table. We also had a doula, Marie, with us for support. Dr. Smith, my OB, and his partner, Dr. Boyd, arrived and the surgery began. Our good friend Rhys is a nurse at the hospital and was alo there to help with the delivery.

The atmosphere in the delivery room was wonderful. Everyone was joking and laughing and it was really about as pleasant as I could have imagined that major abdominal surgery could be! It only took the doctors about 10 minutes to get to the baby (crazy huh?). They pulled her out butt first and, as Kirk loves to tell it, she pooped right away, right on my stomach. Rhys got her cleaned up and took her foot and hand prints.

I could tell the minute that she arrived because Kirk's eyes glazed over with wonder. He was memerized and not paying attention to anyone or anything but her. I had a blue curtain hanging about 6 inches from my face so I couldn't see anything and had no idea whether we had a boy or a girl. Finally our doula nudged him and said "aren't you going to tell Jamie what it is?" He looked at me and told me we had a little girl. We were both suprised because we had thought for the last few weeks that it was going to be a boy.

After she was cleaned up, Rhys brought her around so that I could see her. She was very alert and looking right at me. It was amazing! (Many thanks to our doula Marie for taking all these wonderful pictures!)

Kirk asked when he got to hold her so Rhys gave her to him and he held on to her until another nurse finally asked if she could take the baby to weigh and measure it. Kirk reluctantly passed Sam over to the nurse. That was the end of the delivery and they wheeled me over to the recovery room.


Our nurse allowed us to spend about an hour with her before she went off for all her tests.

This is our OB/GYN, Dr. Smith. He was absolutely wonderful to us during the entire pregnancy and delivery. We are so sad that we won't be in Chattanooga long enough to have him help us with baby #2 (should there be a baby #2!)

My parents were in town for the delivery. They waited anxiously in the waiting room until we were in recovery. Then Kirk went to get them and they found out they had a granddaughter and came in to meet her.


My sister and her husband came up to visit us later that evening when we were settled into our hospital room.


That's the story of our delivery day. It was definitely not what we had anticipated having wanted to try a natural childbirth (no pain medications) but we should have guessed that our child would be stubborn from before she was even born! Though I didn't want to have a c-section, all things considered, it was a wonderful day and we feel really lucky to have had such a positive experience!

Jamie

Welcome to the blog...

Welcome faithful (or hopefully soon to be faithful) readers! I am starting this blog as an easy way to update family and friends on all the adventures of the Hubbard clan. Mainly, I'll be posting pictures and videos of the newest member of our family, Samantha Lee (aka Sam, Samo, Sambo). But you might get a few updates on Kirk, Rosco, and me as well. At some point, I'm even going to try to get some before and after pictures of our first project in Tennessee - the house remodel. The first few posts are going to go back in time to recount Sam's whole journey.

If you want to see a picture better, just click on the picture and it will open a larger version. Please leave your comments so I know that I'm not just writing this for myself. Hope you all enjoy!

Jamie