Lydia's week 4

Weight: 3 lbs 7 oz (got up to 9 oz but then pooped it all out)

Breathing: down to 2.5 liters per minute on the high flow

Milestones: She wore clothes for the first time and took a bath! Lydia also hit the 3 pound mark which is huge! She is a lot more alert and responds to my voice. She is also doing non-nutritive breastfeeding. She has latched a few times which is amazing for a baby as little as she is.


Thoughts: A baby was born at 23 weeks and 6 days. It lasted one day. Thomas had made friends with the dad of the baby while scrubbing in. When we saw him the next day it was heartbreaking. This baby's room was next to our baby so we heard them taking all the pictures and taking off the ventilator. It was really sad. There have been two babies that have passed away since we have been there. It makes me really grateful that Lydia is doing so well.

NICU thoughts and feelings

Lydia is doing well, but it is still hard to see all the babies around her come and go. It doesn't seem fair. They have come in after her but they are leaving before her. It is hard to see parents walk in with their car seats so they can get the car seat check and get the heck out of dodge. I get really jealous.

It also makes me mad that sometimes the family of healthy babies wait in the NICU waiting room. They are all so happy and have a healthy baby that is big and breathing and just fine. It doesn't seem fair and it makes me sad that my baby has such a long time left here.

I have nightmares every night about Lydia. My nightmares are about getting a call from the hospital that no parent wants. It is terrifying and I am not sleeping as well because of it. I think about her every second of every day. Every time I close my eyes I see her. She is so stinkin' cute and I love her so much. It is hard to not be able to hold her whenever I want. I can't wait until she wakes me up in the middle of the night screaming, until she spits up all over me while I'm feeding her. People always talk about how much work babies are and how hard it is to take care of. I think it's harder to have a baby but not be able to take care of her. I want my baby.

On a different note, this week we noticed a baby on a ventilator. The first time I saw her, I thought to myself, "so glad we aren't still on the ventilator". Four days later, that baby was still on the ventilator. It was late at night and there were about 10 family members surrounding the baby's bed. You are only allowed 2 visitors at the bedside at a time, so this was a big cue something wasn't right. Then the dad was holding the baby and they were taking lots of pictures. You can't hold babies that are on ventilators, so this was another big sign. The next day there was a sign by the door that said we couldn't walk that way, but we still heard the ventilator going. I don't know what was going on with that girl, but I knew it wasn't good. Today when we got to the hospital, the bed space where she was was empty. I held Lydia a little tighter today. We have been so blessed to have our baby doing so well.


Look at her cute dimples!!!

Looking so innocent and peaceful

Week 1-3 for Lydia

WEEK 1

Weight: Lydia was born at 2 lbs 6 oz. They do everything in grams though so she was born at 1080. She got down to 1000. She got back up to 1060.

Milestones: She pooped! Lydia also opened her eyes for the first time.. barely. 

Breathing: Lydia was on the ventilator for 1 hour after she was born and then switched to the CPAP. She was then put on the high flow. She started struggling to breathe so was put back on the ventilator. 

Thoughts: NICU life is hard, but we were very blessed. We knew Lydia would be in the NICU for a long time so it isn't as hard to have her there. It would be a lot harder to have a full term baby and then they were sick or something was wrong so you had to have your baby in the NICU. You have your baby's room all set up at home and you can't take her home. That would be rough. We weren't expecting a baby for another 3 months so we don't have anything for her. 

WEEK 2

 Weight: 1130

Milestones: Off the humidity! Increased feedings. PICC line put in and taken out this week. Lydia now has no IV's- just her nasal canula and her feeding tube. 

Breathing: Lydia is on the high flow now!

Thoughts: Lydia cried when they took her away from her daddy when he was holding her. It was adorable. Her cry is so cute and she makes the cutest noises.

WEEK 3

Weight:1300

Milestones: Weening off the high flow, increased feedings!

Breathing: Lydia is doing well on the high flow nasal canula. They are starting to ween her off of it! She started at 6.0 liters per minute and now she is down to 4.5. 

Thoughts: I feel like I'm not going to see my baby enough. We go to see her twice a day, but it is hard to go much more than that. I am pumping every 3 hours. I have to pump for 20 minutes and then clean everything so its more like every 2 and a half hours. The hospital is 20 minutes away so it is hard to visit very much. I feel bad leaving my baby there all day all by herself when she is having such a hard time. I'm glad she has good nurses taking care of her.

Welcome Lydia!

    It was just a typical day. May 7, 2014 I finished teaching at school and went to my doctor's appointment. When we got there, I got my blood pressure and weight and went to the room to wait. The nurse shook her head when she looked at my blood pressure- 164/103. I had been having a little bit of high blood pressure, but I was on medicine for it and it hadn't been that bad. I knew something had to be wrong when it took the doctor about 20 minutes to come in to the room. It usually only took a few minutes. When she came in she said I had protein in my urine. I was officially pre-eclamptic and I needed to go straight to the hospital. I would most likely deliver in the next 48 hours.
   I was in shock. Thomas was in shock. I was only 29 weeks along. We weren't ready. This wasn't the plan. We were supposed to move to Texas June 2 and have our baby there. We already had a doctor's appointment down there. My thoughts raced and everyone's words became a blur. I was in a fog as I walked out of the doctor's office and got into the car. I held it in as long as I could. We went home and packed up and I was still being strong. Then we got back into the car to head to the hospital. I broke down. I wasn't ready for this. I couldn't have a baby yet! I was terrified she wasn't going to make it. I started preparing myself for the worst. I decided where I was going to bury my baby if the worst happened, I kept telling myself the Lord knew what he was doing.
   As we drove up to the hospital, the hospital sign had a picture of a baby and it said "Level III  NICU: down to 24 weeks gestation." After I saw that sign, I knew everything would be ok. It was no coincidence that right at the moment we passed the sign, that was what was up. I knew that no matter what, Heavenly Father was aware of me, my husband, and my baby. We would be ok.
   We checked in and I was hooked up to an IV, a blood pressure cuff, steroid shot to develop the baby's lungs, and monitors to monitor the baby's heartbeat. That night I only slept for about 45 minutes. I was so worried about my baby. I loved that I could hear her heartbeat the whole night. The next day, we met with a doctor who did an in depth ultra sound of my baby. Everything was good, but she was measuring small. This was most likely because of the high blood pressure. We then had a doctor from the NICU come talk to us. He told us all of the odds of survival, disabilities, etc. I felt much better after that. They switched me to a clear liquid diet in case I had to go for an emergency C-section. I sat in my hospital bed, putting on a brave face, but crumbling inside.
   May 9,2014 I had labs taken. My platelets had dropped and they were going to have to do the C-section that night.  I was told I would have an hour warning before the surgery. The nurse came in and said it was time to go... so much for the warning! I was terrified as I walked to the room where I was going to have my baby. I wasn't ready. I was shaking as I laid there and I was prepped for the C-section. In a blessing Thomas gave me, it said angels would be there to lift me up. I started whispering to the angels I knew would be there for me- Ava, Grandad, Ellie, etc. I felt comforted and the surgery began. 30 minutes later I heard a little whimper as my baby was pulled out of me and whisked to a corner to be worked on by the NICU team. I told the angels around me that Lydia needed them more and to go and comfort her. They have been by her bedside ever since.
   The veil is so thin when you have such a miracle baby. She is precious and doing great. There are times she smiles at nothing at all and I know it is because her friends from the other side are there with her. The plan of salvation is real. Angels are all around us. It is so hard to see my baby hooked up to everything and struggling to breathe and not being able to do anything to help her. I feel like I abandon her every time I leave the NICU, but I can't be there all day. I love my little girl and I am so glad she has so many friends on the other side watching out for her and so many friends on this side of the veil praying for her. My baby is so brave. She is so strong. She is a fighter. She is mine.

Project: Apartment Beautification

Thomas and I have been decorating our new apartment--finally!!! Here is a little taste of what we've been up to:

The Living Room

Our Beautiful brown curtains we got on sale! woo!!

We are both pretty proud of this "s". We worked on it together. Precious, I know. We just bought a canvas and covered it with fabric and hot glued blue buttons in the shape of an "s". It is even our wedding colors!!!

This is one of our favorite paintings of Christ. It is "O Jerusalem" by Greg Olsen. It was so expensive everywhere we looked, but we ended up getting a pretty good deal on it! 

This is our big wedding picture that is in the middle of the array of pictures shown below.

My friend Katie gave us that awesome "all because two people fell in love" sign thingy and it is just perfect! Usually people put pictures of their kids under that saying, but we are sticking with the fact that all because two people fell in love, they got married. It works, right?

THE HALL

Our cute little marriage certificate from the temple. 

Everyone has to have a Proclamation somewhere in the home, so here is ours! I really like the frame for it and it was only 3 bucks! We got all of our frames from DI or Savers. It saved us a TON of money seeing as all our frames ranged from 3-5 dollars instead of 15-20. 

This is our pre-marriage frame. All the pictures are from our dating days. There are three little reminders in there of when our anniversaries are of when we got engaged, our first date, and when we officially started dating. Tomorrow is 1 whole year from the day we officially started dating AND its a holiday. Ain't that convenient?

This was Thomas' project. I handed him the pictures and the ticky tack and he placed them. It is fun to have a collage of our favorite scripture stories and pictures of Christ. It is a good reminder to look to Christ. This collage is right next to a mirror so it also reminds us to have His image in our countenance. I think he did a great job!

BED AND BATH

These are our new curtains for our bedroom! They have random birds that are green and blue(wedding colors!) all over them. We got them at Lowe's with a gift card. The crazy thing is that they were with the curtains for little kids. We weren't super fond of any of the adult curtains though. They were boring. We love these though! I guess we have a childish style?

This picture was given to me by my brother, Adam when I was a teenager. I have always liked it and wanted it somewhere in our apartment. We decided to put it in the bathroom because sometimes when you are sitting there it is a real uncomfortable struggle to let things pass, but this reminds us that it eventually will!! Fitting, right? My mom suggested we get wall words for our bathroom that say, "Do your duty with a heart full of song." Get it?? My grandmother had the New Era picture of Christ that said "You are never alone" in her bathroom. It was always a little weird to go to the bathroom in there. I guess our family is full of church related potty humor.

Welp! That's the tour of our decorations. We would love for you to come see them in person sometime!

Brain Gym

So last night at work we had a training on Brain Gym. It was very interesting. First, we discussed how the body responds to different language. The lady had someone stand at the front of the room with their arm at a 45 degree angle and match her pressure. The volunteer said "yes yes yes" and could hold strong, but when he said "no no no" he couldn't hold his arm up. The lady directing the training said that our brain shuts down when we hear negative. She continued the demonstration with having him say " I will try" versus " I will do my best." When we tell ourselves we will try, we are still leaving room for failure and the negative takes over our brain because its easier. She also had him say "I have to" versus "I choose to". This was very interesting to me. I already know that in the classroom we are to praise and focus on what they do right more than anything else, but the word choice we use also makes a huge difference.   

We also learned all about the functions of the right and left hemispheres of the brain. We talked about what happens when you undergo stress and how one of your hemispheres shuts off. This is what often happens when students are test taking. They cannot access the information they know because they can't cross over into that hemisphere. This is true for many students with dyslexia on a day to day basis. They have a processing disorder. Brain gym is a lot of different exercises that help students to get ready for learning or testing. Most of them have you cross the center of your body so that you activate both hemispheres. Studies have shown remarkable improvement by using these exercises with students. One boy took a spelling test of 10 words and only got 2 right the first time. The teacher had him do 10 minutes of brain gym (no studying or reviewing) and then he took the same test again and got 9 right! Amazing! The exercises also help you to relax when you are stressed. When the body is stressed, it locks up and is unable to perform at full capacity.

One really BIG thing she stressed is staying hydrated. When you are dehydrated, your brain can only perform at 64% capacity. If you are thirsty, you are already dehydrated! So drink water before and during classes and tests!!!!!

The most interesting thing for me is that I have a student that is very behind. He is 17 and his reading level is probably around 3rd or 4th grade. After the training, I had him draw figure 8's on a white board for me( one of the exercises we learned), and he could not do it. It had the hardest time crossing over. This tells me that he struggles to access information from both hemispheres. If we can work on these brain gym exercises and using both sides of the brain, I think he will improve a lot. Plus, its kinda fun to just do a few exercises in the middle of your class. It was an interesting training and I am converted to most of it. Some of it was a little too out there for me.

Back To School!

Monday was Thomas' first day back to school! He wasn't excited about taking the picture, but he did enjoy his first day. He has good professors and lots of friends in his classes! It is really weird not going back to school with him. There are a lot of changes that we are both trying to get used to.

Thomas usually leaves for school around 7:30 and gets back from campus around 3:30 or 4. I work from 3:30-8 so we miss each other almost every day. He is also volunteering as a Spanish interpreter at the hospital and for Friends for Sight, a non-profit organization that does vision screenings for the community. This is a HUGE change from us being together 24/7. I miss my baby!!!! He has been doing awesome at staying on campus and studying though and I am really proud of him. :)

We are slowly acclimating to this whole school life. I often run out of things to clean and organize during the day. I have to come up with lesson plans for work so that takes up some time, but not all of it. I often feel like a lazy bum. I was going to get a second job but it would have been full time and Thomas doesn't want me working that much. I wanted to get a cheap sewing machine to play around on and to have something to do during the day, but that will have to wait for a while. We have more important things to get!

Last weekend was our open house and it was a lot of fun! So much fun that this week has been a drag in comparison. I wish we were back in California hanging out with Mike, Erin, and the girls. We had a lot of fun swimming, dancing, and playing with them! I can't wait til Christmas when we get to be with the Seymour family again! It has been fun getting to know the amazing individuals that lie within my new family!