Sunday, August 10, 2008

Surprise!

Ezekiel Solace Pike
born August 6, 2008 5:52pm
2lbs 2oz
13"
Ezekiel: God Strengthens
Solace: Comfort in times of distress

We had our baby! He is 3 months early, poor little guy. We're still unsure why he decided to come so early. He is doing very well. Here is the story...

I woke up wednesday morning around 3:30am with contractions about every 6 or 7 minutes. I didn't know what was going on as of course, it's not time yet! At 4am I got in the bathtub and stayed there an hour while Daniel went to pt (physical training). When he got home at 5 I was still in the tub and miserable. We looked in our pregnant books to see what was going on, thinking maybe braxton hicks, right? Once we realized that wasn't what it was, we decided to call our midwife, Joi. She said I could possibly be dehydrated (I had had the flu sunday and monday) and to drink as much water as I could in an hour... if I wasn't better by then she told me to go to the ER. Soooo I drank and drank and contractions got closer.... 6:45am we decided to go to the hospital. When we got there contractions were just a minute or two apart and we soon discovered I was already 6cm dialated (and not dehydrated at all). At this point they rushed me up to labor and delivery. They put me on drugs to slow down my contractions and to *hopefully* stop labor (at which point I would have been on bed rest in the hospital until the baby came... as long as 3 months.) The idea was to keep the baby inside me as long as possible so they could administer steroids to him which are needed to help him breathe once he is born. (As you can imagine I was very unhappy to have to take these drugs but my midwives assured me that the things they were giving me were absolutely necessary for Ezie to live.) They hoped to keep him in me up to 48 hours to give the drugs time to take effect. Well, after the drugs my contractions slowed down and I layed in bed all morning. At 2pm they checked and I was 8cm. At 4:45pm I was fully dialated, but my water still hadn't broken. Since they couldn't stop labor they took me to the birthing room to break my water and start pushing. After 20 minutes of pushing, Ezekiel was born. We were only able to touch his head briefly, as they needed to wisk him away to the NICU and make sure he would be ok. That was the hardest part, seeing him being carried out of the room right after birth. But it was necessary and I am glad they were able to help him. He is a strong little guy-- he cried when he was born! Most premies can't cry when they are this early- all the doctors and nurses were surprised. God is so good to us! Anyway, Daniel was able to go watch as they got him stabilized. I, of course, was still in the delivery room delivering placenta. (the placenta was amazing to look at. My midwife and the doctor both said I had a very large and healthy-looking placenta.) I felt soo soooo relieved once Ezie was born. All you women who have given birth know what I mean, I'm sure. I felt empty though... no more baby kicks. :( I really miss him being inside of me.

Today is Sunday so at 5:52 this afternoon he will be 4 days old. Yesterday they took him off the ventilator and hopefully today they will be able to start feeding him some breast milk. It's been a rough couple of days. We just got home from the hospital yesterday.

I'm sure many of you realize that we were planning to have a home birth, and this is not what we expected at all. But God has been so good to us in this whole experience. All of our doctors and nurses were very kind and very good at their job. No one tried to shove an epidural down my throat. No c-section, no episiotomy. Thank God! Overall our stay at the hospital was a great experience, and I really don't like going to the hospital. The only thing that really sucked was the IV in my arm. I am so thankful for hospitals and smart doctors in situations like this when they are really needed.
Now pictures!


This is the last picture of us before Ezie was born. Saturday, Aug. 2 @ camp sychar, under the tree where we met!

Ezie has to have this blue light on him to help with jaundice. To protect his eyes he has to wear a "batman mask".



10 comments:

Sarah said...

Congratulations Daniel and Kristin! Welcome, baby Ezekiel. I'm glad to hear from you, Kristin, and I am praying for your family. I hope you and Ezekiel can try breastfeeding, but don't give yourself a hard time if he's not up to it.

Anonymous said...

*WELCOME BABY EZIKIEL!* Prayers going up for all of you. (((((HUGS))))) sandi

Anonymous said...

Oh sweetie, I am happy and sad for you all at the same time. You are very much in my prayers. Congratulations on your beautiful baby boy. I know this is not what you had planned.

My niece was born at 28 weeks so I know a little bit about preemies. She turns 4 this month is PERFECT by the way!
Email me if you need someone to talk to, or I can put you in touch with my SIL if you want to talk to someone who has REALLY been there.

Kristin said...

Thanks for all your encouragement ladies! I feel better after reading your comments :)

We are breastfeeding... or should I say I am pumping? They just started feeding little Ezie yesterday but he didn't take to it too well so they held off on his feedings until this afternoon. When we go back to see him tonight we can find out how he did with todays milk.
We are believing God for perfect health- we feel like that is what we are supposed to pray for. :)

Anonymous said...

Congratulations on Baby Ezekiel!!!
I found your blog looking for information on being sued for a minor fender bender!!!Ha So I am being sued over a minor fender bender ,just got the papers on friday.So what happened with your law suit? I read lots of your blogs and looked at all the pictures.
You and your family are beautiful!!!I am also a christian,I am for Ron Paul too !!!

Kristin said...

Janice,
Hello! It's so funny how you found my blog-- thanks for reading. :)
I'm sorry you're being sued-- it sucks, doesn't it? We can form our own little support group. :)
It seems as if the person suing us will be dropping the suite (sp?). We only hear from our lawyer every few months when something actually progresses. Of course, your situation may be different, but in our case things are moving very slowly and it seems as if we won't have any problems. We did have to hire a lawyer which was about 1500 bucks. That was a bummer. I think the guy suing us realized we are poor and don't have anything for him to get. Anyhow, I don't know how helpful this information all is to you... don't worry about the situation too much-- just pray! God will meet your needs. i will pray for you too! :)

Teresa said...

Daniel, Kristin, Ezie,

Welcome, Grandson!!! I love him so much already! I look at his little pics on the blog with squinted eyes, trying to see better. Maybe it's time for me to get some "granny glasses". :-)
I am still sitting here in Kazakhstan, waiting to leave with your baby sister, Ezie's Aunt Sophie! lol how funny! We hope to see you ASAP. We will need to take a bit of time to recover from a 2 month trip, but hope to get there soon to give out hugs and kisses to all of you.
We miss you terribly, and we pray for you all daily.

Love,
Teresa for all
(Gma)

Anonymous said...

Hi Kristen and WELCOME EZEKIEL!!! I am Goldie's SIL and am praying for you and your warrior. Like Goldie said, our daughter was born at 28 weeks weighing 1 lb 15 oz. It was a tough road for a long time. Ezekial is a strong little man. Although he (and you!) are on the roller coaster of your lives, he will show you that size does not equal might, and that God has made his tiniest with such strength and resilence you cannot know unless you are there.

Here is one resource you may find particularly helpuful, the ivillage
exclusively pumping board:
http://messageboards.ivillage.com/iv-ppexcluspump

It will be awhile before they let you start even putting him to the breast, so this board will help you with tips and insight to get your supply going great. Feel free to contact me as well if you'd like. Goldie can share my email address with you privately I'm sure. I'm not sure how to do that!

I am convinced that breastmilk is a large part of the reason why my daughter bounced back successfully so many times when she hit obstacles, and why she is so healthy now. I know it's hard to pump like crazy on top of everything going on, but know it's so worth it.

Kristin said...

Hi Goldie's SIL! Thanks for your prayers and encouragement. It's good to know you made it through the nicu experience still pumping/breastfeeding. I'm not going to quit, but I sure do want to sometimes! I haven't looked at that website yet but I will later today. (right now I gotta go pump! of course!)
Thanks again. I'm not sure how to do the private e-mail thing without putting my e-mail on here, but I bet we can figure it out. I'm sure I will have questions to ask you!
It's good to meet you. :)
-Kristin

Anonymous said...

Goldie came to the rescue!
Check your email :)

Keep on keeping on.

~Goldie's SIL