a dangerous introduction

oh me oh my oh me oh my!
one of robyn's best friends andrea sent me this little baby lulu number for gigi and it may be the end of me. oh my goodness. i knew about baby lulu before i had greta but never did i imagine how amazing it would be on my daughter. andrea may dress her kids better than anyone i know, her daughter piper is what greta aspires to dress like. trevan is getting another job as we speak to start paying for greta's wardrobe. a dangerous introduction indeed mrs. reid.

can you handle it?

greta meets daxton

my good friend jana and i missed each others baby birthdays by 6 days. today they met for the first time and are bound to be friends! jana is my hero, she had daxton all natural and he weighed 9.7! something i am glad i will never have to do. there is a 2 pound difference between them and although greta is older dax is a big boy! cute babies.....

greta loves daxton

while i've been down.....

getting ret' to go

greta with her namesake

i'm afraid, she's afraid, we should ALL be afraid.

pretty in pink isn't she?

the shallow grave i belong in

turns out i was not made for this whole child bearing thing. only through modern medicine do i live.

me + having babies = disaster.

i haven't updated lately because things have been a bit....hectic. a few days after i got released from the hospital i started to get my postpartem depression again. i tried telling dr. parker that i really got "that" sick emotionally after i had jude, i had to go back to the hospital after i had him. he thought that by putting me on the mini-pill it would do it. well, not so much the case. yet again i was spiraling out of control emotionally which is a bit scary to watch (sorry mom and trev). poor greta has a crazy mommie. thankfully, dr. parker is also easy to get a hold of being a family friend. i was on my high dose of estrogen and anti-depressants in no time and on the road to recovery or so i thought. my story does not end there.

about 24 hours into my hormone therapy i started getting really sick. with a temperature of 102 and severe lower back pain we had dr. parker on the phone again. this time he told me to go the emeregeny room because what i was describing sounded an awful lot like a uterine infection. so trev took another day off work to go spend a day at the ER with me. after several doses of some serious pain medication, 2 IV's, blood work, and some nice warm blankets i was sure enough diagnosed with a uterine infection and a bladder infection. i guess a uterine infection is kind of a big deal and scary, who knew? they also gave me some heavy duty antibiotics through my IV and left the bad boy in so i could return to the ER the next 3 days for more IV antibiotics. i was also severly dehydrated and was put on bed rest for a few days.

the good news is i am better now, getting better i guess would be the better way to put it. let's just hope this can all be in the past and i can start to enjoy greta. i really REALLY wanted a big family (4-5 kids) but after these ordeals i don't know if i am cut out for it. i just don't know how people do it. i look at my mother and am in awe, literally. the woman is amazing. there are many reasons i should not be alive today but for about 90% of them she is the only reason i am. she is the reason my family is still alive this week, trev and i don't know what we would do without her. thank you mom.

where i should be and thankfully am not

greta pamela gregory

greta pamela gregory
april 02, 2008
9:17 pm
7 pounds
21 inches

you have to love modern medicine and an epidural

after 12 hours of natural labor and little progression, scary baby heart rates, and other factors i had a c-section to get my baby here.

greta was born with the cord wrapped around her neck twice, around her arm, torso, and leg. no one knows how that is even possible but dr. parker did say that it was one of the longest umbilical cords he had ever seen. needless to say she had a bit of a rough start. she didn't breathe for the first 4 1/2 minutes or so. the doctors bagged her and suctioned amniotic fluid out of her lungs to get her to breathe.

it was horrifying for both trev and i. after they take the baby out they continue to operate on you for about 30 minutes and you cannont see anything. there was just silence in the operating room and no one would tell me what was going on. even trevan had no idea what was going on.

after the doctors got her to breathe they whisked her away from mama and took her to the nursery to be observed.

trev waited in the nursery for an hour and half to bath her. apparently, there was a baby in worse condition. slowly, greta's condition started to worsen.

meanwhile, they took me to my recovery room and i was freaking out. i didn't know what was going on with my baby and no one would tell me anything. i waited 2 hours after i delivered to actually see and hold my sweet greta. at this point greta was having major troubles breathing and her oxygen levels were dropping. the charge nurse brought her into me so i could see and hold her and after about a minute her levels started dropping rapidly. so once again they whisked my baby back to the nursery. i was an emotional wreck. jude didn't even get to see her except when they were wheeling her to the nursery. he kept asking to hold her. i was heartbroken.

finally i settled down enough to sleep (thank you percocet). at 3:30 am the charge nurse came in to inform me that greta was going to the NICU because of her oxygen levels and would be put on oxygen and fed through and IV. she also told me she would AT LEAST be in there until i went home. great news. i started sobbing uncontrollably. because i had a c-section i could not go down to the NICU until i could get into a wheelchair. p.s. with jude i didn't get up until 24 hrs after he was born.

in the morning i painfully got out of bed and into a wheelchair so i could see my baby. the NICU was packed with babies and my wheelchair would not fit in but we made it work. finally i got to hold my sweet precious beaituful baby greta for more than a minute. it was heaven.

that afternoon the peditician dr. glade said that she was doing better and that the reason for all the trouble was most likely from her cord being wrapped around her so many times and the stress of birth. had we not had a c-section she would have never had made it. he also said that she could come out for feedings and that if she could handle eating than they would slowly taper her off oxygen and eventually her IV.

i made sure jude was there for her first in-room feeding. jude and sissy finally got to meet each other. oh yeah, i have 2 kids now. crazy.

he is the BEST big brother and so proud of his new role.

while greta was in the NICU jude got some mommie time in. not the best picture of me but i love it. the hardest part about this whole process is my worrying about jude and his new role. i don't know how to love both of them. i love love love him.

after 20 hours in the NICU miraculously greta got to come out and be with us permanently (or so we thought). all though we were ecstatic, i think were both exhausted.

daddie and his kiddies.
my little family.

beautiful baby greta. her poor face is so beat up from the tape they put on to hold the oxygen tubes in. i love her bright eyes and puppy dog skin under her neck. priceless.

trevan is such an amazing husband and father. i love that he stays with me in the hospital. i love having him there as a support. it was even better because he could go be with greta in the NICU while i stayed in bed. he is amazing and loves his little princess. i love this man.

my sweet babies

day 2 brought new excitement for greta. her bilirubin levels were high and yet again they took her away from us and put her under the lights. this time we could not hold her like we could in the NICU but she still could come out to eat. all though it was terrible to have her in there she sure was cute under the lights. she looked like a little hollywood starlet basking in the sunlight.

her poor beat up feet

well, if you know us at all, most things that can go wrong do. we don't have the best of luck. we wanted to experience everything this time at the hospital. we got to have a 12 hours of labor, a c-section, the NICU experience, the rooming in time, and then the jaundice situation. our days at the hospital were not without excitement, each day was something new. i am just grateful i had a c-section so i could stay longer and not go home without my greta.

all and all, i have an amazingly beautiful daughter who will be healthy shortly. she is perfect and so much better than i expected.