Pandemic Babies

In the spirit of oversharing, here is the official story of Emery's birth. 

After over nine months of hyperemesis and avoiding anything with a semblance of flavor, I was ready to meet our little peanut. Unlike her sister, Emery and the placenta she made did not cause me any sort of problems with hypertension. My blood sugar was great. This was a textbook healthy pregnancy, excepting the trips to the ER for fluids and general aversion to most of the foods and smells in the world. The only complicating factor was the worldwide pandemic that descended on us in the last few weeks of what could have otherwise been a pretty stress-free delivery. It could have been much worse, and we were lucky- Jarom was able to be with me the whole time, and they hadn't had any patients with known COVID-19 come through L&D. It was still very hard though when I realized my mom wouldn't be there and that Riley wouldn't be able to meet her baby sister in the hospital. 

All in all though, many things went very smoothly. After my appointment right before my due date, the facility scheduled my induction for a few days later. Unfortunately, nothing was rocking and rolling yet, so I had to get a foley bulb placement 24 hours ahead of time, which... is not pleasant. 0/10, would not do again. Fortunately, it did its job pretty fast, so heading into the hospital was pretty calm and relaxed (as relaxed as a major life-changing event can be). 

"You're not going to be the baby anymore!"

Just hanging around waiting to have a baby

There's always that period of calm before the storm after getting Cytotec. You're looking at all the other anonymous spikes and dips of the contractions in other rooms while your TOCO is flat as a pancake, an actual one of which you're currently munching on. 

What Labor?

Then, you start to get them. At first, you think you might be able to ride it out for a lot longer. Then, it gets worse and worse. We moved onto the pitocin after things had moved along well enough. At first I thought I could handle it, and in-between contractions I could. But each wave was worse than the one before, and it got to be epidural time. 

"Ow."

I firmly believe most anesthesiologists have the same personality. A complete nonchalance as they're impaling your spinal cord with a giant needle. After everything was placed, and I forgot what contractions were, everyone started chatting. Everyone having masks on, I didn't recognize my nurse. Turns out that the nurse on my night shift was in my church stake growing up, went to my high school, was someone I recalled knowing fairly well (!???!). She recognized me by my name before even coming in. To be honest though, I remembered her strongest as a 13 year-old, and it was a bit of a shock seeing her as this awesome grown-up super impressive nurse. Then, the anesthesiologist mentions how he's a bishop in the church stake Jarom and I currently live in. I'm mostly glad this conversation is going down when I'm in zero pain and can actually enjoy the weirdness of it all. This was a gooood epidural. One could not have placed a better epidural. 

Unlike Riley though, I didn't slip off into a blissful sleep. I felt nothing at all painful or uncomfortable, but pretty soon after Jarom started snoozing late at night, I felt weird. I had uncontrollable shaking, and my body felt... funky. I told my awesome nurse (that I still kept picturing as a preteen) who got the CNM and I had transitioned to being over an 8. After that, things happened fast- soon I was a 9 and a half. The room filled with people, it was go time! I was disappointed that it took more pushes than Riley's four (it took about 8... maybe 10?), and suddenly at 3 in the morning, we were meeting baby!!

No matter how much the nurse midwife (Side note, I was unsure about using a CNM for delivery- Kaiser lets you choose when you're there if you want a physician or midwife delivering and I decided to give it a go. Great experience, seriously.) tried to slow things down, I ended up with the exact same outcome as last time. They were good about pumping me full of Tylenol and Ibuprofen though, so that by the time the epidural wore off I was good to roll down to recovery. Not having the hypertension meant that a lot of things were tons easier. No clown feet! No BP checks every hour. I only had the epidural in a couple hours too, so I was bopping off to the bathroom on my own in no time. Someone brought up going home. Going home!?!!! That sounded amazing. We were in recovery about as long as we were in L&D, but it draaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaagged. I was tired, I was uncomfortable, I had an IV still in (it literally took all day to get someone to take that thing out), and I was running on fumes. All I could think of was my $8,000 remodeled en suite, high thread count sheets, and epidemic-free house.  

It was National Nurses Day though, and I know they were all busy and tired too, so I tried not to be cranky and ride it out. Everyone worked very hard to make it possible to get us home. Or they just wanted to specifically get rid of us. Either way, we were immensely grateful. 

Sleeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeepy

Naturally baby 2 tested high for bilirubin too, and we were scheduled a follow-up lab and dr appointment for the next day- which I was not at a good place to handle. The multiple hospitalizations and 100 mile ambulance ride in the snow storm with Riley kinda ruined jaundice for me. (Fortunately, as the pediatrician later said, Emery is a "good stooler", so her numbers looked much much better the next day.) 

Various nurses helped with the arduous task of discharge, and we were soon out the door that evening. It was pretty magical that despite the changes we were still able to have family meet the baby the same day she was born. Riley was... confused... but liked the baby's new hat. No amount of Daniel Tiger and explanation can truly help a 2-year-old make sense that the baby living in mama's tummy is now the baby in the car seat. 

"This is what mama was doing. I will too."

Cousin Evelyn very very very excited at the idea of a new sister/cousin

Some things of note: Emery's middle name was something we discussed at length. Jarom was hesitant because I had wanted to somehow have something from my family, but I felt very strongly about choosing this name. We found out we were pregnant when we were visiting his family in Utah, and were able to tell his grandma when we were there in person, the last time we saw her. I've always loved his grandma so much, and we mourned her passing a few months later. 

Additionally, my family has many ties to Hawaii- several generations beginning as plantation workers. My great-grandma was brought up in an orphanage on Oahu following an accident her father had, making them unable to afford raising her and her sister. Unknowingly, my parents were married in the same chapel that stood on the orphanage she was raised on, something which they didn't learn until years later. My grandma was born in Hawaii, it was her home, and somewhere she would often reflect on returning to. That grandma was my mom's mother, and she passed when my mom was only 30- just a few months after I'd been born. She passed on May 6th, the day after my grandpa's birthday and the day before my dad's birthday. The grief of her passing has always weighed heavy on my family, most especially on that day. The one day I did not want to have a baby was the 6th... There's moments though, in the stillness after birth when you feel like you and the new baby are the only ones in the world. For a second, I felt like it wasn't just the two of us. My grandma told my mom once before she knew she was sick that she wanted her sad memories to be replaced by happy ones. Specifically in the new generations of her family. It could have been coincidence that the joy from the birth of our new baby coincided with the tragedy of the much too early loss of my grandma, but my hope is that I didn't imagine how I felt. I felt strongly, very strongly that she wanted us to finally celebrate instead of grieve. 

Mauna Loa is a sacred name and a sacred place. We view this with a vast amount of respect. Mauna Loa is the name of someone we love and miss. It is from a very special and meaningful place and history to our family. 

We are so grateful to my parents and sister who've carried us through this pregnancy and birth. Even though we recently moved into our own house, Riley and her cousin Evelyn had been raised nearly as siblings. Catherine has gone above and beyond to help while I've been sick, and has filled a huge role for us caring for Riley the last couple of sleepless nights. Evelyn, Riley, and Emery are so lucky to have such amazing grandparents and to be raised with so much love from so many people.