A new baby!

As you likely noticed I have not posted for quite a long time, and while it has not been uncommon for me to go a few weeks without posting, I have rarely gone this long.  For those of you who are wondering what possibly could have kept me away for that long, here it is: it was a boy, an andorable cuddly, sweet little boy:

 At 36 weeks, I once again developed pre-eclampsia.  I was much further along in this pregnancy before my blood pressure started to climb and we were able to make it to 38 weeks before the doctors felt it was necessary to induce labor. 

Labor was pretty uneventful until the end.  Once they broke my water, I quickly went from 5cm to 8cm.  It was at that point they lost the baby's heartbeat on the monitor.  After unsuccessfully trying several times to find his heartbeat, it was decided they needed to do an emergency C-section.  It was discovered that my acrobat baby had not only managed to wrap his extra-long umbilical cord around his leg and torso, but he also managed to get it tied in a "true knot", which had cut off his oxygen and blood supply when he quickly descended down the birth canal.

Sam joined our family on June 10th, weighing an even 7. He was healthy and perfect.  Then we went home.  He developed jaundice which required him to be readmitted to the hospital at 5 days of age to undergo light therapy.  Fortunately, they only kept him for the night, but it was still a difficult experience for us.  The light therapy brought his bilirubin levels down and we were able to bring him home.  However, the following week, he was looking very yellow again and it was determined that he had breast milk jaundice.  This is caused by a substance in breast milk that prevents their body from breaking down the bilirubin.  We were told that I would need to stop nursing for 24 hours and give him formula during that time. After the 24 hours, we could resume nursing and he could also consume the milk I pumped during our nursing break.  I hated to stop nursing for any reason, even if it was only for 24 hours, but I also hated the daily, sometimes twice a day, blood draws my little guy was having to go through and the almost daily doctor's appointments and visiting nurses were starting to wear on me too, so we gave it a try.  It worked wonderfully and his levels have come down and not gone back up.  Now, the golden hue to his skin is due to his Mexican genes and not his inefficient liver :) 

Sam is now 1 month old and doing well.  The pediatrician is still a bit concerned that he is gaining weight too slowly (he is a 1/2 ounce shy of his birth weight, as of yesterday), but none of us are concerned about his long-term prognosis. 

With life settling back down, I am excited to get back to blogging.  We still have more doctor's appointments than I would like, for both the baby and myself  (my incision did not heal perfectly and we are also monitoring my blood pressure and adjusting medication as necessary), my computer also bit the dust this morning (we are pretty sure it is the motherboard) and we are dealing with a lice infestation that my daughter brought home to us, so my writing will still be sporadic, but I will be here as often as I can.