Deacon's First Birthday!

A few videos of Deacon's birthday celebration, as requested by Yaya and Papa!

A Birth Story on a Birthday

Deacon, just minutes after his birth... And Deacon, last week, just days before his first birthday!

Deacon is one year old today! I realized I've never really recorded either of the boys' birth stories, so I just wanted to take the opportunity to get a start on it now.

Deacon's birth story actually starts a couple weeks before his actual birth. At 35 weeks along, I started having contractions one afternoon. They didn't really "hurt", but I could tell they were stronger and different than the Braxton-Hicks contractions I'd been having for some time. After a couple of hours of having them and it seeming like they were coming closer together, I called the nurses station at the hospital and they told me to come in to get checked out. Todd had to stay home with the kids since they were already in bed and I figured I'd be home in an hour or two anyway. Turns out I was contracting about every 4 minutes. I spent the night in the hospital under observation that night as they were having some trouble getting the contractions to stop. We had one more shot of terbutaline that they could give me and if that one didn't work and my contractions continued, it was starting to look more possible that this baby was going to come quite a bit earlier than planned. Thankfully, with that last shot, they slowed enough that they felt comfortable sending me home with medication to take to help keep the contractions at bay. I was to take the meds for at least another week, and then my doctor said I could stop and if I started having contractions again at that point, they probably wouldn't try to stop them. All of a sudden we realized we needed to hurry up and get our poop in a group at home to be ready in case we had a baby sooner than we were expecting! I finished my week of the meds and then stopped taking it and as soon as I did, it seemed that I stopped really having many contractions so I figured we were back in it for the long haul. My actual due date wasn't until August 15, but I was scheduled for a repeat c-section on August 13.

Fast forward to July 26, and Sunday morning. Jackson woke up at 5 am with a bad dream, so I got up to go lay with him for a minute so he would go back to sleep. When I got back in my bed, I felt a big contraction. I tried to go back to sleep, but I was sort of just waiting to see if it would happen again. And it did. These puppies definitely felt like they could be the real thing, but I'd never actually "gone into labor before" (I was induced with Jackson) so I kinda just laid there and waited for a while seeing if they would peter out. Todd had to get up at 6 am anyway to head to work so I figured I'd just wait and see what happened and not wake him up. When he did wake up, I casually mentioned to him that I'd been having some contractions, but I didn't really know for sure if they were the real thing yet or not so just to go ahead and plan on going to work and I would call him if I needed him to come home. So Todd got in the shower and I figured I should maybe get up and pack a hospital bag since I hadn't done that yet. I got up and started puttering, and as almost as soon as I started walking around, the contractions started getting closer together. Todd went to go get some coffee and I decided I should get in the shower "just in case". While I was in the shower, it seemed like the contractions were right on top of each other and it was hard to stand still. I remember trying to shave my legs in between contractions and then dancing around the shower while I was having a contraction. When Todd got home from getting coffee, I finally told him that I was pretty sure I was in labor and that he should probably call his work and call his mom. He kinda looked at me like, "Duh" and said he had already done both of those things while he was out getting coffee. Apparently he knew I was in labor before I did! We called the hospital to tell them I would be coming in, and they said come in asap, especially since I was supposed to have a c-section. Todd's mom lives 40 minutes away, so we knew she wouldn't get here before we needed to leave, so we called a friend to come over and get Jackson until Grandma could get here (Thanks Michele!).

When we got to the hospital it was probably about 7:30 am and I'd been having contractions for almost 2 hours at this point. They immediately put me on the monitor and checked me so they could report to my doctor. I was shocked when the nurse said I was still only about 1 cm dilated because I was thinking that if these contractions weren't changing anything I didn't know what would! I asked the nurse how effaced I was and her exact words were: "Well, I'm not really good at telling that." I think my jaw just about hit the floor. I wanted to ask her why she was checking me then, but I refrained. After 20 minutes of monitoring, and finding that I was, in fact, in labor, they finally gave me a shot of terbutaline to try to help stop my contractions and started calling in the surgical team. Mind you, this is a small hospital and it was a Sunday so they don't have all of the necessary people in hospital at all times. My doctor showed up about 10 minutes later and checked me and was TICKED when she found that I was really 4 cm. dilated. Things started to move pretty quickly from there. My contractions came back pretty quickly and were quite uncomfortable and by the time the surgical team was in place and I was already 6 cm and kinda just wishing I could skip the c-section at this point and just get the show on the road. I got into surgery and everything went quite well from there and I was happy because I got drugs so I wasn't feeling contractions anymore. Todd watched the entire surgery and after a few minutes, Deacon Jeremiah was born! We didn't actually have him named yet at that point, so all of his hospital bands say Baby Boy Vogel. He weighed 6lbs. 8 oz. and was 19 inches long. Not too bad for being 3 weeks early! I only got to see him for a few minutes before they took him to the nursery to get cleaned up. And then I had to stay in recovery for a while so it's always a good hour or so before I get to see my babies again, which is frustrating. But Todd was taking good care of him and it gave them some good bonding time together. I was amazed when I got to see him again that he looked so much like me because I remember being so shocked when I first saw Jackson and he looked so much like Todd.

Deacon amazes me still. He is the most cuddly little boy, loves to be held, loves to snuggle, and is so quick to smile. He just is generally very good-natured and lovable and I can't imagine our world without him.

In case you hadn't heard...

It's a GIRL!!! I think most everyone heard the news via facebook, but thought I should put it up on the blog for posterity! We are so excited, and I've already been dreaming about the whole new world of shopping that has just been opened up for me! Todd is very afraid!