What a difference a week makes!!

Well here is the abbrieviated version....Cami had been having some trouble feeding. Her suck-swallow-breathe pattern was really not organized at all and she was gulping and choking while nursing. It had just started when she had her 2 week check up and the pedi said that she could have the same trouble that Chase had, but left it up to me to decide whether or not to do the swallow study. So after watching my baby struggle to breathe when she ate, we had the study done. I wanted so badly to be wrong about this..... She is aspirating. We are having to thicken her milk and feed her from a bottle, not something we are accostumed to around here. She was doing so well with her routine when she was nursing. I don't think we heard her fuss at all. Well, that has all changed. She is pretty well pissed off at me for holding out on her. So sad to watch her face when I feed her from the bottle. She is taking 4 ounces at every feeding (only takes Miss Piggy about 10 minutes) but still has the need to suck and dosen't really prefer the pacifier. I am trying to pump to keep up with her demand, but since pumping dosen't come easy for me I don't know how long that will last. We have had to give her 2 bottles that were half formula and she spit up afterwards, not good since she aspirates that as well. We will repeat the study again in 4 weeks and HOPEFULLY she will be able to resume nursing.

The rest of the story....

*********WARNING: REALLY LONG POST***********

I can't believe that our little girl is going to be 3 weeks old tomorrow. Here is the rest of the story.......I went to the doctor on Monday the 19th for a check-up. My doctor was out of town, of course, so I saw one of his partners assured me that Dr. Harris would be back well before my due date. Then he checked me....i could see the concern on his face. "How long does it take you to get to the hospital?" he asked me. I told him that once I got everyone loaded up, about 35-40 minutes. Chase was with me at the appointment so he assumed that by everybody I meant me and Chase. No, I told him, he has 2 older brothers. Hmmm he said, do you usually stay home with them by yourself. Ummm, that would be a "Yes." And does your husband work close to home. That would be a "No." He then told me that I was almost at 4 cm and 80% effaced and having some strong contractions. His concern was that if my water broke at home my 6 year old might be delivering his baby brother/sister. Tony had made plans to work at home on Tuesday, so Dr. Ehmer told me to call him Wednesday morning and let him know how I was feeling. (I was still a few days away from 38 weeks.) So Wednesday morning I called him and he told me to come to the hospital. I had already taken Ethan to a friend's house the night before and had another friend coming to pick Blake up that morning, but Chase had croup...so Daddy stayed home with him while I drove myself to the hospital. Tony's mom came up to stay with Chase since he was sick and Tony came up to the hospital later that morning. I got my epidural around 11:30 and then Dr. Ehmer broke my water around 1:30 and at 2:33 we had a baby. When she was born, the cord fell between her legs and Tony said "It looks like another b...." then he starts laughing "IT"S A GIRL!!" I didn't really process what he had just told me. "What? It's a what? How did that happen? What do you mean it's a girl?" I had pretty much convinced myself that it was going to be another boy, so to say we were shocked would be an understatement. We had worked so hard on boy names and I brought boy clothes to the hospital. It is all we had known. She was 8 pounds 13 ounces and 19.75 inches long. so she had the chubbiest cheeks, a triple chin and rolls everywhere. She was the best baby from day one. Tony had to go home that night to be with Chase and mom stayed at the hospital with me and Camryn. With all of the boys it seemed like we were up all night at least for the first week. Miss Cami saw the opportunity to be better than her brothers and she took it!! She has been the easiest baby by far. She eats and then goes back to sleep. Rarely fusses or cries. We thought that because she was 2 weeks and a day early that that had something to do with it, but her due date was last Thursday and she is still sleeping a lot. She is starting to have more awake time, but not a lot.
She loves to be swaddled!! The girl can sleep for hours, yes even at night. She usually eats around 11:30 and wakes up around 4:30 or 5:00 and eats and then goes right back to sleep.
Ethan LOVES his little sister. He wanted very badly to have a little sister and enjoys her more and more every day. He will lay beside her and talk to her anytime she has her eyes open. So sweet.

Blake enjoys showing her off. He wants her all dolled up with a bow on her head and a matching blanket (he can't match his clothes mind you, but wants her to match!) He does tell her that he didn't care if she was a brother or a sister, he would love her the same.

Chase...oh Chase. Chasey has been an emotional wreck since Cami came home. He loves her, loves talking to her, kissing her head, bringing me her paci, covering her up, burping her, holding her......but I think that he is just following big brothers lead. He will be happy one minute and then has a complete meltdown the next. We are all waking on eggshells around him. We are thinking that it has something to do with him being so sick when we went to the hospital. Either way, we are ready for him to get over it!!

Cami had her first pedi appointment on Monday the 26th to check her weight and billirubin. Her bili levels were good, but her weight was 7 pounds 14 ounces, so they told me to bring her back in 2 days. Well, we had an ice storm come through so they rescheduled her for the next Wednesday which would have been her 2 week checkup. Then on Friday, they called and said that they had made a mistake and that the doctor wanted her seen TODAY. I didn't want to take 3 healthy boys into a doctor's office, so I told them I would see what I could do. Tony was at the office, his mom was tied up and again I did not want to go and take the chance on the boys picking something up while we were there. This is where it gets exciting.....I am on the phone with the doctor's office explaining the dilema to them when Blake starts throwing up. Poor kid emptied his gut a few times, got in the shower and then started making his usual demands...crackers, Sprite, some books, a blanket, etc...... The doctor's office calls back and said that it is imperative that they see Cami because she had lost so much weight. So I call mom, she drops everything and makes a run up here to sit with the boys so I can take Cami to the doctor. Blake is now over whatever it was that had his tummy upset and is prancing through the house when Nana arrives. He wolfs down a bowl of chicken noodle soup and about a dozen crackers and goes outside to jump on the trampoline (yeah, I'd say he is over it.) We had some warrany work that was scheduled for that day, so the workers show up as we are trying to feed the 4 kids and get off to the pedi. I leave the house and as I enter the freeway, NOTHING!! 4000 RPM's and only 30 mph!! So I exit, thinking maybe it slipped out of gear, pull in to McD's put it in park, then back in drive and it seems fine. So I take off and as I get on the feeder road, same thing. I turn around and head home barely making it to the driveway. I call Tony at work, give him the news that the transmission is gone in the burb and then move Cami and all her gear over to mom's Jeep so I can get to her appointment...which we have now missed and end up having to wait until the office reopened after lunch. We get there and the nurse weighs her....9 pounds 2 ounces!! WOWSERS! What a relief! That was pretty much the only thing that went right that day, everything else was crazy.

And it's time to feed again...............

Newborn Pictures

I did not do newborn pictures with the boys, but since she is our last Daddy said "If this is something you think you might want to do, then do it now!!" So Miss Cami had her first photo shoot yesterday. Of course she stayed awake for almost 3 hours!! She was 11 days old, which is a little old for newborn pics, but we had to reschedule since we were iced over on Wednesday. I am glad that I went ahead and did them. I absolutely love the one of all 4 kiddos....

To view the sneak peak, you can go to Jill's blog and check them out.