Gavin Jon Michael

August 12, 2000 ****8.2 lbs, 20"

Our pregnancy journey started back when Katlyn turned one. I decided then I was ready to try again for another baby so I went off the pill and we began the wait. Little did I know that it would take us a year to achive our goal again, but this time I would be able to learn why it would take so long.

After 6 months of trying and frustration and false alarms, i started charting my temps in the mornings. After a couple months of this i was able to see that my luteal phase was only 7 days.This causes problems cause the egg doesn't have long enough to be implanted before the next cycle begins. Needless to say i was very upset, but figured eventually it should straighten itself out since i'd been pregnant 2 times before.....right? So, along with help from online friends, i went in search of anything i could do to help the problem correct itself quicker. That's when i learned about B-6 helping a lot of women to increase thier LP's. So i tried it! The first month it added 3 more days to my LP, the next month 3 more, then 3 more....i was so happy! That 3rd month of taking it was November/December 1999. now i knew we had "timed" things right that month, but it wasn't the first month we had, so i wasn't getting my hopes up.

On day 16 of my LP (December 8th) i talked myself into taking a pregnancy test since i wasn't for sure how long my LP would be that month since i hadn't been good at taking my B-6 every day. So.....off i go to the bathroom early that morning to do the dreaded test. I say dreaded cause i've never gotten a positive result that early with a hpt, so i wasn't looking forward to seeing a negative...

To my everlasting surprise in those 2 minutes that i waited that second line showed up in the control window to declare that yes! we'd finally gotten our prayers answered! I cried and cried like a nut! I couldnt' get over it, especially getting a positive so early like that! I kept going back all day and checking it again to make sure it was actually positive (dont we all do that?) :) I even seen my mom that day and couldnt' tell her cause i'd already decided i'd make it a Christmas / Birthday gift for her! I was just sure that she could see it written all over my face that day! I didn't even tell Robert that night cause he wasn't in the greatest of moods after work and i wanted it to be a good occasion when i told him. (hehehe)

So the next night as he was at the table i handed him a card i'd made to let him know. he looked at me all funny, wondering what the occasion was to be getting a card that night! So he reads the little poem i wrote and sits there all quiet like and i'm thinking "WELL????" Then all of a sudden he jumps up and grabs me in a hug and swings me around the living room!!!!!! :D He's as tickled as I am at the news and cant' wait to start picking on my expanding belly and talking to the baby!

oh, for Christmas i made gift packages for mom and Gary, Dad and Larry and Betty to let them know the big news. It's a jar of baby food wrapped up with a little card attatched with a portion of the poem i wrote in Robert's card, the ending line is "we'll always have love...." then they open the package and read the tag before opening the wrap over the jar "...and room for one more." Mom was so close to tears and couldn't believe i waited 2 weeks to tell her!! LOL! Dad couldnt' figure it out and i finally had to give him a BIG hint! hahahah! it was great that day. :)

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Things went well the first few weeks, nothing out of the ordinary, just like my other pregnancies, then at the beginning of January we had a terrible scare. Me, Robert and the kids had come back from Wal-Mart and my back had been hurting, so i laid down to take a nap. When i got up i went to get a snack and took a call, while i was on the phone i kept feeling like i was having a very heavy discharge or something, so decided to go check. What I found scared me like crazy. i was bleeding heavily and all of a sudden i felt 2 blood clots coming out. So i'm sitting on the potty, not knowing what to do, and just start crying. Robert comes running to find out what's wrong and freaks out. He tries calling mom, but the line is busy so he takes off over to her house to get her. We all go to the ER and the whole time i'm thinking that i've lost my baby now. After a year of trying, and 12 weeks of pregnancy, our baby was gone so quickly.

After 5 hours in the ER and internal and external ultrasounds and checks, the prognosis is that my placenta was trying to detatch from my uterus....probably only a corner of it was effected at that point and the baby was still alive, but my chances of keeping the pregnancy was 50%-70%. I was put on complete bedrest until the bleeding stopped for 2 days and then no kind of heavy work (even vaccuming) for a week after that.

Amazingly the bleeding stopped in 5 days and i was able to go to church that Sunday. I must admit I think it's only by the grace of God that our baby stayed in his little cubby hole.

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Needless to say the rest of the pregnancy was relatively smooth, no major scares came up again (thank God!) and we looked forward to the arrival of our little guy. On 8-11 i had my regular dr. appt and was wanting to have him go ahead and put me in the hospital and break my water. I was ready for this little guy and Robert would be going out of town the next week so i wanted him to have as much time as possible with us before he left. Well, he didn't want to put me in cause they were busy up there, but he did strip my membranes (i'd been at 3 cm and 70% effaced for 3 weeks) to see if that would go ahead and kick start my labor, and if not, then to come on in at 10 am the next day and they wouldn't let me leave without the baby. :)

The morning of the 12th I woke up all through the night with regular contractions, starting at 10 minutes, and finally hitting 2-6 minutes apart, but of course they decided to stop around 7 that morning while I was getting some final stuff together to take with me. I was very frustrated to say the least. I was hoping to at least be in labor when I went in! So anyway, we head on down and get there about 10:15 and get registered and head on up to L&D where they just hook me up to the monitors to see what my contractions are doing......if anything. They also checked my dilation and I was finally at 4 cm!! *yeah!*

They ended up being quite busy that day too since they already had 3 women before me in labor and another came in while I was waiting for a regular L&D room! Ok, so after about an hour on monitoring they come in and give me a Hep-lock in case I need pitocin later, but they do go ahead and give me an IV for fluids (though I'd been drinking some Gatorade and had a bowl of cereal for breakfast. ;)

At 12:40 the nurse broke my water and found meconium in it. I was worried, but she wasn't, so I made myself focus on what lay ahead and just praying that things would progress quickly and that I wouldn't need any pitocin or want an epidural. Boy, was I going to get my prayers answered!! At 1:10 my pains started coming regular and painful enough to have to breathe through them already. My back was hurting with the pains cause they had me on my back at first and when I rolled over the belly monitors would lose the heartbeat. Not long after that they were moving me to a regular L&D room and when I got settled in they hooked up an internal monitor to keep up with the baby and to actually see how the contractions were since the belly monitors weren't picking up anything. I told my mom that the monitor was lying!! :) When they put the internal monitor in I was checked and had progressed to 5 already *all right!* not sure what time that was though.

The contractions kept coming regular and faster and more painful, but I noticed the difference between this and my other 2 pitocin labors.... there wasn't any pain between the contractions! I could smile or laugh (barely. hehe) between them and even keep up with what everyone was saying in the room (my family was all in there). so even though the contractions hit hard, I was fine in between.

Sometime about 3 o'clock I started shaking with the contractions and I told my mom to tell them that I was hitting transition. I told her probably 3 or 4 times to tell them cause I wanted them to know it was getting closer, since with my labor with Katlyn the transition went fairly fast (under an hour I believe). So she told the nurse and the nurse comes in @ 3:07 to check me and sure enough I was 7 cm and the baby was at -1 station. (he'd been floating til they broke my water). So then the Dr. comes in and tells me that another lady down the hall is going to deliver soon and it looked like she'd beat me, so he'd be back to deliver our baby as soon as she finished. I was like 'all right, whatever, darn, don't go anywhere!' LOL! Then I hear the nurse come back in and she's getting the delivery equipment ready and tells my mom "just in case she fools us and goes faster than what we think she will" ;) well, every since I'd hit transition I'd had the urge to push. mom had been watching me and telling them that I was already pushing. (Robert fussed on me once saying "breathe Gina! you gotta breathe!" and I said "I CANT BREATHE WHEN I'M PUSHING!!" :)

So about 3:11 I holler at mom to tell them that 'he's coming!! I'm pushing!! Tell them!!' I can feel him coming down the birth canal now and I was so worried that the dr. and nurse wouldn't be there cause they'd be at the other lady's room and no one would catch the baby! I started reaching down to catch him but the contractions kept hitting and I couldn't stay up long enough to grab him. I was still on my side at this time so I couldn't see that the dr and nurse were there now. (Doug said the dr. came around the corner on one foot to get to the room! hahaha) So here I am still hollering and my mom finally gets it through to me that the dr. is there and to hold on to her, so I did! I grabbed her in a hug and was holding on tight while I was pushing more. I was able to think that if I wanted to get him out I needed to get over on my back at least a bit, so I started to roll over and they got my right leg in a stirrup when his head came out. The dr. had to hold his head while he finished putting his gown on! They also got him suctioned out really well since the meconium was in the water. Then out the rest of him came (Robert holding on to my other leg).

I felt immediately great when he came out and was able to help wipe him down when they laid him on my belly. He started crying and didn't want to open his eyes to the bright lights! :) His apgars were 9/9. After laying there for awhile and enjoying looking at him they take him to weigh him and he's 8.2 lbs. they measure him later in the nursery and he's 20", head is 14 1/4" (never had time to mould) and his chest is 13 1/2". So I won the bet Robert was having cause he said Gavin would weigh 9.7 lbs and be 22" and I said he'd be 8 lbs and 20"!! can't get much closer than that! HA! :)

Daddy and his 2 boys

He looks so much like his big brother (just in a smaller package) and that means he looks like me! :) His hair is dark, but his brows are blonde (like Canaan's were), his complexion is dark like Katlyn's and his eyes are blue for now. He took right off to nursing once he figured out what was in them. lol! he's up about twice a night so far which is great to me! when we left the hospital he was weighing 7.8 lbs, but I think he'll gain it back quickly with how he eats! he's got a squeaky little cry he starts off with before deciding to put some gumption behind it, too cute! he's not a big burper so far though so he spits up a bit between feedings.

I didn't get any stitches this time which surprised me cause it sure felt like my whole insides were splitting apart! but I'm walking ok and I stopped feeling like everything was gonna fall out whenever I stood up. :) my milk came in and so far I'm doing ok with it. the fullness isn't anything like it was with the other two.

The kids are crazy about him too. Canaan always wants to hold him and they are hilarious when it comes to watching me nurse him! when they first seen me doing it they both went and grabbed a baby doll and was 'nursing' them!! LOL!!! they ask questions about it all the time. :)

Robert is all over him. he snuggles him, kisses him and just is nuts about him! keeps asking him if he's ready to get in the floor and wrestle with him. :D

So that's our house now, a little bit busier and a lot more interesting! :)

Gavin, one day old	Just after the birth, family of 5 now!

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