Labor of Love

Born at 5pm weighing 8Ibs

I started having contractions about 6 PM on Thursday. That's when my mother showed up with Mary, it was excellent timing. When we got to the hospital I wasn't quite 4 centimeters dilated yet but the contractions were coming two minutes apart so they had me walk around the hospital having contractions every two minutes until I was 4 cm dilated (It was a very slow walk). When I was 4 cm dilated and they admitted me to the hospital. As I was walking to the room I would deliver in I had a very strong contraction and asked for the epidural (nicely). The woman came very soon after I asked to do the epidural and it started working quickly. That was extremely nice.

Very awake

Soon my midwife came in and asked me to rest until 8 o'clock in the morning (at this point it was about 2 AM). I was able to sleep most of the night (epidurals are amazing) and when I woke about 8am my midwife broke my water and came back about noon to check on me. I hadn't made much progress so they gave me pitocin and the contractions started to pick up by 3 o'clock. I started feeling the pressure to push but my midwife wanted me to wait and let that pressure push the baby down that way I wouldn't have to push very long and it worked because I started pushing about 4 PM on Friday and after my first push you could see his head! Unfortunately my midwife was helping someone else deliver their baby at the same time I was trying to deliver mine so after a couple pushes and it was clear that the baby was coming very soon they had me wait for my midwife (apparently nurses are terrified of delivering alone, cause I did ask them to do it). It was the most uncomfortable 20 minutes of my life and as I waited the girl who was delivering with my Midwife was screaming bloody murder the whole time (she did it naturally, hence her taking precedent over me).

I kept feeling the urge to push while I waited and it felt like the baby was half out and I just had to hold him halfway in and out of the world! It was so painful that I had to resist the urge to yell “Rachel!!”,my midwifes name. Finally Rachel came in and I was so happy to see her! I finally go to push again! It was really cool to have my mom, Melissa, and Mary there. I hope Mary it wasn't too scarred because she was holding my hand most of the time that I pushed. The pain and pressure was still quite uncomfortable so I had Nath distract me by telling me stories about our trip around Europe, it worked pretty well. At one point they tell me to look down and I saw my midwife pulling out my baby Oliver and she placed him right on top of my chest having done nothing to him. I'll never forget how I felt. He was so amazing and so beautiful and so wonderful!

I didn’t have long with him before they took him to the NICU because they were worried he'd swallowed too much poop. Nathan got to go with him so soon I got a text from him that Ollie was doing well. The first thing I did after hearing this news was eat some fruit loops! I was so hungry! I had gone about 24 hours without food at this point. After the yummy cereal the nurse took me to the bathroom to shower. I remember thinking the bathroom looked like a murder scene as I left it. Yikes, that was a lot of blood!

After the shower I was taken to the mother-baby unit. I got to order a big cheeseburger, fries, and chicken strips. It was really good food! It wasn’t much later that we all fell asleep. Oliver did great that first night! He slept about 4 hours, ate, and then slept another 6 hours! The second night was not as great, but still good, its been downhill since!

           

          I really don’t mind the lack of sleep too much because I get to see the most wonderful baby boy every 2 hours in the night. He has made Nathan and me so unspeakably happy! I am VERY much enjoying motherhood. I am learning to be more selfless, kind, and caring. He makes me want to be a better person, because someone so perfect deserves a wonderful mother. Everything I do now, I do for him.

Oliver Kai Mulligan

Our Sunny and Surgical Summer

Me and my Grandma Zinn!

          To celebrate the good news we recently went on a trip to California to visit my grandparents and go to the Happiest Place on Earth: Disneyland! We drove from Rexburg, Idaho to San Jose, California in one long day. We had to go through the desert at midday with our A/C deciding when it would like to work, which was not very often! We were so glad to make it to my Grandma and Grandpa Zinn's house in San Jose. The weather was amazing!

          Our first full day there we took a trip to San Fransisco. We crossed the Golden Gate Bridge and went to Fisherman's Warf. At the warf we found a fish and chip shop that was owned by an actual Brit! I thought it was great. Nathan thought there was something to be desired. Anyway we just walked along the warf and looked at shops. One place we saw had a bunch of really old coin operated pier games. We both got 50 cents to spend on a game. I got a fortune from an old woman in a box and Nathan spent his on watching two executions! Those were so strange it was kinda funny.

Fisherman's Wharf

          On our way back from San Fran we stopped into the Redwoods to meet up with Nathan's cousins for dinner. We had a great time talking with them and I learned even more about cute little baby Nathan. :) We really enjoyed the pictures they showed us of Nathan's family back in the day. They were so welcoming and nice. I love meeting Nathan's extended family. They are always so kind.

         Our second day we went to Santa Cruz with my Aunt and cousins. The water was freezing but it was still lots of fun! I liked watching Stephen teach Nathan how to skim board. Stephen was really good at it. Nathan was ... not quite as good :) When we got back we realized it was pioneer day and a tradition in the Zinn family is to make homemade butter. We had to shake a jar til our arms hurt but there were lots of us so we shared the burden. The butter was super yummy when we were done! The last day we were able to spend just hanging out with my Grandma. It was really fun. She took me shopping for maternity clothes and now I am all set! The next day we set off for Fresno, CA. 

The Haunted Mansion at Disneyland

         In Fresno we were able to see my Grandma and Grandpa Shaw. My Grandma was still in the nursing facility and had some kind of virus recently so when we went to visit her I had to stay out in the hallway because I was pregnant and they didn't want me to get sick. I was glad to visit them both though. I love them lots! We also got to hang out with my Aunt, Uncle, and cousins that live in the area, the Hueys. They took good care of us. 

       After Fresno we went to one of my favorite places ever.... Disneyland! We went for two days and it was really fun! I couldn't go on a few rides because of the baby but that's why Disneyland is so great because I still got to go on a lot of the rides. Although, the ride Soar'n made me pretty motion sick! :) While at Disneyland Nathan got a call saying his surgery had been moved from the next monday to this coming friday! We weren't planning on being in Rexburg again til next sunday so we had to get home faster than we had hoped so we had to cut our visits to Julia Meservy in Vegas and to the Fischers in Heber very short! I was pretty disappointed but they didn't have another opening at the hospital for weeks after so we had to make it to Heber, UT the next day! That meant driving through the desert again at midday! So HOT!!!!!! Oh my gosh! The A/C wasn't working again so I just chewed ice the entire drive from Anaheim to Heber. We did get to stop and meet Julia and Joe Meservy for lunch. It was so fun to see Julia so pregnant! She looked so cute! 

The Happiest Place on EARTH!

        We finally made it to Heber pretty late that night and could only stay til the morning but I did get to tell the Fischers I was pregnant in person which I had been trying to arrange since we found out! They are always so good to us when we visit, too bad we couldn't stay longer. We had to leave at 9 in the morning to get to Rexburg in time for Nathan's pre-surgery appointment. 

        

OUCH! (Nath made me
post this sad picture)

        On Friday Nath had the surgery. It took 6 hours and then he had to stay the night at the hospital. He was pretty loopy still when we took him to Rachel and Josh's house til our apartment was ready to move into. I was so grateful for Rachels help during the day! Nathan was in bed for days and was on about 6 different medications he needed at different times of the day. It was a lot of work but Rachel is an excellent smoothie maker which helped Nathan get through those first terrible days. 

     
      Now Nathan feeling pretty good considering it's been about a week and a half. He gets better everyday. Because he is on liquids and soft foods our blender has been used more than ever. I wouldn't be surprised if it just gave up on us soon! (Written August 12th, 2013)

We're Preggo!

             I’m PREGNANT! Nathan and I are now expecting our first child. We are so excited! I am only about 6 weeks pregnant so its still very new. I found out I was pregnant Tuesday, May 21, 2013. A few days before, I had felt the symptoms I believed to be PMS, so I was pretty sure I was not pregnant. How very wrong I was. I took the pregnancy test while Nathan was at class because I was sure it would be negative I just wanted to be 100% sure. I did what needs to be done and I saw the positive line appear. I could not stop staying “holy crap, holy crap, holy crap!” I could not believe it. I was so excited! 

             I was supposed to meet Nathan in just an hour for devotional but I wanted to tell him I was pregnant in a cool way. I decided on what I wanted to do but I needed more time so I had to sit through devotional without telling Nathan I was expecting. It was so hard! It seemed like everything he said was a perfect lead into… “I’m pregnant!” , like “How’s the weather?” and “Man, I miss Preston.” See how tempting it was! Anyways, I managed to keep it together until the end of Devo. 

             I went home and began baking a cake. When the cake was done I began writing, “We are Pregnant!” but the cake was smaller than I thought so it became, “We’re Preggo!” When Nathan got home we ate dinner and then I told him I made dessert. I pulled the cake out of the freezer (he might have seen it earlier if it was in the fridge) and I handed him the cake. The cursive “We’re Preggo!” was a little hard to see on the cake but he got it pretty quick. He said, “Really?!?” then he hugged me. We are so excited! (I wrote this post when I was 6 weeks pregnant I just didn't get around to posting it til now)

We did not eat the part of the cake touched by the pregnancy test!