Happy Em. Happy Mike. Happy Life.: Boston Michael Lowder

Boston made his debut on January 3, 2014. Not early enough for the tax credit, haha! Before he was born we already knew we were going to name him Boston. Mike was hesitant about the name at first but I loved it and Mike warmed up to it. For his middle name I had been telling Mike for months I think Boston Michael sounds like a perfect name, but for some reason he didn't like it. I eventually told him that he could choose the middle name since it seemed to be pretty important to him. He had a few he was choosing from, but I am glad he picked Michael, after Mike and my dad Mike. The night before I started having contractions I actually asked Mike what he was leaning towards on the middle name. I'm glad I did because the baby came the next day. Boston Michael. I love it. Anyway. Here's the story.

Thursday January 2- I wake up and automatically think "the baby could be coming today!" because for the past like week or so I had been thinking that every morning. I laughed to myself and got up to get ready for work. That morning I noticed I was kind of having small cramps, but didn't notice too much. In the afternoon around lunch I noticed that I was still having cramps but they were getting a little more uncomfortable. Nothing horrible, just I noticed when they happened and it wasn't great. I timed a few and they were around 10 minutes apart. I texted Mike and told him about it, but I said don't worry it could just be Braxton Hicks, the baby shouldn't be here for at least another week. (I was convinced Boston would come after his due date.) The day kept going on and the cramps started to get a little worse and to 8 minutes and my back was hurting too. I got home and tried to rest. Mike came home and we took it easy. I painted my toenails. I asked Mike if he thought this was the real thing and he said "It could be." I'm glad I had finished packing the hospital bag earlier that week and had already gotten the carseat in. I called my mom and told her what was going on and I could hear her grinning from ear to ear. She was SO excited! Around 11 Mike and I went to bed. By this time the contractions were hurting enough that I couldn't sleep through them.So Mike slept and I watched movies for a few hours. I wanted him to sleep just in case, so then he could go to work tomorrow and get up early. For some reason I was so worried the contractions would stop and it wasn't real labor. I told that to my mom numerous times, I am sure she thought I was crazy.

Friday January 3- The contractions kept coming and they were not feeling good! I was having to breathe through them like they taught in our Lamaze class. I noticed it helped a tiny bit to stand up, too. So I would stand up every contraction and breathe. Mike would wake up and hold my hand. I love him. Around 3 I told him the contractions had been about 5 minutes apart, a minute long, for an hour. So we packed up our things and headed to the hospital. We got there and was put in the triage room, or the "we will monitor you" room. I think we got in just around 4. The nurse was really nice. She checked me and I was at a 1. Yay... she put on these monitors to monitor my contractions and the baby's heartbeat. She came back in an hour and a half and said she wanted to do a little more monitoring. She checked me and I was still a 1. She came in after that just before 7 and said they were going to admit us because the baby's heart rate was occasionally dropping a tiny bit after contractions. If that wasn't happening we would have been sent home. So, we were admitted, I let my mom know we were and texted a few people like my boss and family members. My mom showed up and that was nice. I liked having her there. After we were admitted I was put on all these monitors again, and that really sucked because it was hard to work through contractions just laying there. I was getting discouraged. Our nurse was really nice, I loved her. She was so great and sweet. The broke my water, which I did not like. That was painful. Eventually I got some pain meds, and those helped with the contractions. I could still feel contractions somewhat. The medicine made me really sleepy. I was really emotional that day it was crazy. I had wanted to make cookies for my nurses, but I just didn't. And Mike mentioned that to me in the hospital just joking and I started crying. I didn't mean to! It just happened. My photographer, Suzie, showed up. I was excited to have her there. She was really nice. I felt bad she was sitting around like all day for this baby to come and nothing was moving forward. Around lunch time Suzie left for lunch. She went to Ikea and came back with an Ikea magazine! I love Ikea. Mike will never go with me, but I love it. Whenever I get those magazines at home I look through it with a red sharpie and circle everything I want. Anyway, she brought me back an Ikea magazine so I was looking through that. The nurse came in and I asked for another dose of whatever it was that I got. It made me sleepy again so I didn't make it through my magazine :( A little while later the nurse came back in and said something about the anesthesiologist going into an operation and if I was even thinking about getting an epidural it would be a good time to get it because he would be unavailable. So I told her I'd take one, and then she left and I started crying again. My goodness. Nothing was going with my plan. I hated laying in that bed just not being able to do anything except breathe through contractions. Anyway, the anesthesiologist had come in earlier that day and had talked to me, he was really nice. So he came in and only one person could stay in the room. Mike hates needles so I had him leave and my mom stayed in with me. I was surprised that it didn't hurt! It was like a little pinch. The IV was worse than the epidural. Eventually I couldn't feel my contractions and I had mixed feelings about that. It was nice to not feel them, but I also didn't like feeling what was going on. And plus from that point forward I could just eat ice chips. Time passed slowly. I had gotten checked a few more times and still no progression. I was so discouraged. Eventually they told me that I would be getting a C section so to get prepared for that. Mike got stuff to wear. I cried. I asked Mike for a blessing. He gave me a great blessing and it really comforted me. My mom FaceTime'd my dad, and I bawled. Again. I cry so much! It's ridiculous. My brother and dad came down, and I was still waiting to go back to the operating room. We all made guesses on what time the baby would be here, how much he would weigh, and how long he would be. Around this time, my epidural was wearing off pretty good because the medicine ran out and the anesthesiologist was in an operation. The contractions hurt! Mike was really good and helped me through them. I got prepped for the operating room and was given a block or something so I was pretty numb. I got sick and threw up all my water from the ice chips. I was really nervous. The anesthesiologist gave me some disgusting drink thing to have to help with if I threw up in the operating room. I took that, and then when we were getting ready to go I got really nervous again and threw that stuff up. It was disgusting going down, and it was disgusting coming back up. I started shivering uncontrollably. We made our way to the operating room. I was switched to another bed I think, and the blue sheets were put up. I was so scared! I don't know why! I was shivering so so badly even though I wasn't cold, and I was having a hard time concentrating on things. The anesthesiologist was great. He was up by my head and had his face pretty close to mine telling me it would be okay as Mike held my hand. It really helped. I don't remember much from the operating room except I remember the anesthesiologist played U2 on his phone for me and that really helped me calm down. I also remember Mike saying something like "You jumped out of an airplane. If you can jump out of an airplane, you can do this." And then one of the people was talking about that. And then at one point one of the male operators (I don't know what they are called) said something like "What! She has no stretch marks! I have more stretch marks than her!" Haha. During the surgery it was a weird sensation because I could feel my body being moved, but I couldn't feel really anything else. Mike did a really good job holding my hand and staying by my head. I think he wanted to watch a bit, but I think I had him nervous with how I was acting. Sad. I was nervous. At one point I remember being kind of calm because I had a thought come about how Jesus knew exactly how I felt and that was really comforting. Boston was born and they put him over the curtain. Mike got great pictures. Boston started crying and I could kind of see him a little bit as they dried him off and stuff. I didn't get a great view until Mike came to me with the camera and showed me a picture of him. Boston Michael Lowder was born at 5:48 PM 6 pounds 11 ounces, and 19 inches long. (Remember the guesses I talked about earlier for his weight and length? I guessed his weight and length right on! Whoo!) The anesthesiologist gave me some meds to help with my nerves. They stitched me up, moved me to a different bed, and handed Boston to me. I was so happy! And he was so beautiful! We got rolled back to my Labor and Delivery room. I was still shaking so badly. I was shaking too much to try to attempt breastfeeding. That and I was so numb. So my mom gave Boston a bottle. I got to do skin to skin time with him and that was wonderful. Next thing I know Mike is on the phone and my parents are on FaceTime and Facebook sharing the news! I don't recall how long we spent in that room. We got rolled to the Mom and Baby section of the hospital. I was numb for quite a while. That night around 2 AM the nurse helped me walk to the bathroom and back to my bed. The next day Mike and I took 4 walks around the hospital wing. We were told I would heal up faster if I did walking. Mike did an awesome job helping me to walk around the maternity ward and remembering to I also got this abdominal binder or something. It's this long thing that wraps around my stomach, and I can't believe how much it helps me.

We had a few visitors at the hospital. My mom, dad, Nate, and Suzie were all waiting for us in the Labor and Delivery room. On the other days ny mom and Syd came down twice, it was so fun to see them both times. Brandon, Mike's brother came to the hospital a few times. He took care of Waffles while we were gone. I appreciated that. Some friends from work also came to the hospital to see Boston. And they brought me a delicious cookie dough shake! Yum!

We came home Monday. It has been an adjustment but so nice to be home. We have even had a few visitors at home already! Grandma Medsker came by today. It was so nice to give her a big hug. Sometimes a big hug and a cry with grandma makes everything perfect in the world again. We have had a few ward members come by, I hope they enjoyed holding the baby! I really appreciate the dinners we've gotten already.

On one of the days at the hospital, a lady came around and took some pictures of Boston. If you want to see them, they are at bellababyphotography.com and the access code is ahos0105lowder . They will only be up for two weeks, so take a look before they disappear!

These pictures below aren't in order. There are too many of them for me to try to put them in order. Sorry!

Boston has arrived! This is one of my favorite pictures!