Happy Birthday Jocey!

This weekend, my baby turns 2! It seems just like yesterday that I was holding Jocelynn in my arms for the first time. She was just as stubborn then as she is now. For about 2 weeks before she was born, she was head down, so I thought for sure she was coming soon. I had been having braxton-hicks contractions for 3 weeks, we walked every night, ate spicy food every night, EVERYTHING we could do, we did to get her here. But no such luck.

I was admitted to the hospital the day before and they started the medication to induce labor. It was a long night of very weak contractions that just did not progress. Then, early the next morning, I felt a HUGE movement inside of me. The nurses came in a few minutes later to see if the heart monitor had moved out of place. It had not moved, which meant either Jocey was in distress or she had moved. The nurse kept moving the monitor around, but could not find her heartbeat. Luckily, my doctor was walking by my room at that very moment and came in when he saw two nurses in there with me. He asked what was wrong, and went back out to get an older ultrasound machine. He put the wand at the top of my abdomen, and voila! She had gone breach. Because I was still having contractions, we had two options - I could go home and wait it out, or we could do a few things there to see if she would flip.



Since I had already been given my IV (3 times), we opted to stay. We walked the halls, I took a shower and rocked back and forth, I layed on my side, nothing worked. So, Dr. Swainston opted to do an aversion. An aversion is when they dope you up with muscle relaxants, then manually push on your abdomen and baby to get them to flip. She must of have been caught on something because they did this 3 times (which is NOT fun), and finally on the third time she went transverse breach (this is when the baby's back is facing down). We had no option now but to go home and wait or have a C-section.



This was a huge blow for us as we had wanted to have a natural birth. We weighed the options then had a couple of our friends, Mike and Dustin, come and give me a blessing, in which I was told I would heal quickly. Jon and I knew that it would have to be C-section or we would probably lose Jocey. So, they prepped me for surgery, Jon got dressed in his "pajamas" (scrubs), and got ready to go to the operating room. My mom and sister, Sara, were both there, as well as Jon's sister, Dawnie. They said they would hang out until I got out of surgery.


Luckily, that night, the head of the Anesthesiology Department was working, so he administered my spinal block. He was awesome. I didn't feel a thing! YAY! Now, if you know me, you'll understand this next part. As soon as I had the medicine in me, I went numb. And I mean NUMB! A spinal block is only administered once (THANK GOODNESS!). The last thing I remember was seeing Jon come into the O.R. and asking the doctor if I could go to sleep. That's it folks! And it's a good thing I was so out of it because Jon said that they were moving me around pretty harshly, and Jocey must have been stuck on something because Dr. Swainston told his associate not to move or both of us would be in trouble.

Jon says I asked why she wasn't crying when she first came out and if she had hair. He says that she didn't cry at all when she came out, but had her eyes wide open looking around as if to say, "Hey, I didn't agree to being out here! Where am I?" He says she didn't make a sound until they put her on the cold measuring table - definately a Vegas baby.





The next thing I remember, I was waking up in recovery just as they were about to take me to my room. The anesthetic made me sick and I was throwing up for the next few hours. Jocey had to go to the NICU for 24 hours because she had inhaled some of the amniotic fluid when they took her out of me. She was seriously the biggest baby in the NICU though. I didn't get to see her for 24 hours because I was recovering and coming out of the anesthesia. The nurses finally told me I could go down and see her if I could walk to the nurses station, about 10 feet away from my room. I was bound and determined to see her, so I walked all the way down to the NICU (which was about 20 feet down the hall). She was my beautiful baby and I was so happy to see her.

Here is a little video I made of her first few months on this earth. I love this song because it is beautiful and it absolutely depicts what I feel each time I look at her. I am so thankful for the miracle that she is and that we were able to bring her into this world. I can't believe that was two years ago. I love her so much and am so grateful that she came to live with us. Happy birthday, Jocelynn!