The Kovar Khronicles: baby

Showing posts with label baby. Show all posts

Sunday, September 8, 2013

Macie's First Gestational Birthday

Macie was born on March 29, 2012.
She was due on May 16, 2012.

Raising a baby is so interesting.
You have some general idea of when they will probably do certain tricks,
Hit certain milestones.
But a baby does what it will do when it is ready.
When you throw prematurity into the mix,
It takes the guessing game to a whole new level.
You never know if your baby will do things around the same time as babies born the same week,
Or with those that were born when they should have been.

Adjusted age and chronological age are a big deal when you parent a premature baby.
You talk about them both with equal weight.
And you talk about both of their dates everywhere.
That's where the "Well, she's 12 months but she was born two months early" comes from.
People would look at my 12 month old daughter,
Whose gross motor skills are in line with her adjusted age (10 months old,)
And if I just said, "She's 12 months old,"
I would get incredulous stares, every time.

Adjusted age and chronological age are equally important in our family.
Someday that will fade and we will only talk about Macie's actual age.
But for now, we definitely wanted to mark both birthdays.

So although she had been one for almost two months,
And had a pretty awesome first birthday already,
We also celebrated her gestational birthday on May 16, 2013.

Of course, I took some pictures to mark who she was at the time.
Our yard had just bloomed so it was the perfect setting.
And the dress, a gift from my mom, made her look like a little princess.
I loved so many I couldn't pare them down.

The day itself was just a day about Macie.
I took her on a walk to the park all by herself.
Let's face it - the third child does not get much alone time with Mom.
She had a blast.
We came back and played, played, played with the boys.
And then we ate cupcakes that Ephram helped bake during Macie's nap.
Yes, we sang to her too.

I'm so grateful for every day of our first year.
It was a year full of miracles.
And she's a daily reminder of everything good.

I just love her so.

Thursday, July 18, 2013

First Easter Do-Over

This was Macie's first Easter.

She was 11 days old.
We went to visit her in the hospital in the afternoon.
Charlie was in Arizona with his cousins.

I went into her room alone.
We were still keeping the chaos of our children away from our healing daughter,
Who needed all of the peace and quiet she could get.
Just three days earlier she was finally clear of her two chest tubes, ventilator and arterial line.

Andy let me go first.
While he played with Ephram in the many kid-focused waiting rooms Evergreen Hospital holds -
I held my little girl for the longest time yet.

40 minutes.

And I stared at her for hours longer.

I remember it being an overwhelmingly peaceful and calming visit.

I remember feeling like we were being pushed to happy places,
And by pushed, I mean that I could feel the prayers and energy of friends and family
Pushing into my baby's room.
It was that palpable.
And I was so glad for it.

I sheepishly went out to the lobby after something like three hours to give Andy his turn.
I hadn't meant to stay so long before giving him the chance to see his daughter,
But I was pulled to her and I just couldn't leave that room.
Because while things were so much better than they had been days before,
My baby was still in a hospital on her first Easter.

We couldn't bring anything to put in her bed yet.
No little stuffed bunnies.
No shirts that said My First Easter.
I didn't pick her up from bed as we woke in the morning.
Instead, I woke well-rested.
Not the way a mother of an 11-day old should be.
We couldn't bring her downstairs with us in the morning to peek at what had been left to find.
I couldn't hold her freely.
I couldn't even nurse her.

So although I was so grateful and happy and relieved,
There was conflict in knowing that it wasn't quite right.

I wished my baby girl a Happy Easter.
I spoke with her about the miracle that we celebrate with this holiday.
The miracle of life.
And how appropriate that seemed given the eleven days we'd just survived.
And then I promised her that the next Easter would be a little more enjoyable.

So this Easter, 2013,
Was not my baby's first Easter.
Technically her last "first" holiday was St. Patrick's Day.
But I don't care, I gave her a first Easter do-over.
We had a fantastically wonderful day.
(Even if we did have some pretty good colds.)
And I still gave thanks for my own little miracle of life.

Monday, July 15, 2013

Macie at One Year

That's my beautiful little, one year old girl. Man, what a year. Really, what a year and a couple of months. The rollercoaster we shared really left the gate a month and a half before she was born, and went through some incredible drops in the beginning. But our highs have far surpassed those lows. I know that I have written about it endlessly, and I beg pardon for anyone who feels I may have taken it too far. Here's why I've spent so much time writing about it on my blog:

I am proud of what we've done and I want to remember it, and I want my daughter to know it too.
For my own medical documentation, I want to have a record of everything I can remember. In case I'm crazy enough to go down this road again post-HELLP.
Because it's been amazingly therapeutic for me. I feel that my writing, and the occasion it has given me for frequent reflection has saved me from the level of postpartum depression I could have reached.
For others. When I was in this situation, I searched exhaustively for tales from others. There were very few to find. Now I've added one more to be found. And if we could help one other person to get through their ordeal, to not feel alone, to have hope in positive outcomes... everything will be worth it.

I did a lot of reliving of this journey in the months before her birthday. If you haven't read our story before, or if you want to reread it in parts, here are links to the different pieces.

Also, I think it needs to be said that the emotions that followed Macie's homecoming surprised me both in their intensity and their duration. I never realized in considering the potential of having a premature baby, the fact that most of the emotional work would be done after everything was alright. I've also tried to document much of this emotional journey:

And I promise not to share any more links. Whew, I've written a lot about this little girl and about how we got to the special One Year milestone!

My little girl at a year was just as she should be. Practically perfect in every way. And I'm so lucky to have her in my life.

Stats:

Chronological Age - 12 Months

Adjusted Age - 10 Months

Weight: 19.5 pounds, 16% normal charts/75% preemie charts

Length: 28.5 inches, 19% normal charts/50% preemie charts

Head Circumference: 18.9 inches, 98% normal charts/100%+ preemie charts

*I waited until 13 months to take Macie in for her one year appointment, so these stats are from her 13 month visit, however all percentages compare her to other 13 month old babies.

Milestones:

Army crawl - 49 weeks
Takes practice steps while holding someone's hands - 49 weeks
Says "Dada" and "Mama" - 50 weeks
Starts rocking on all fours - 52 weeks
First all fours crawl - 52 weeks
Pulls to a stand - 52 weeks
First zoo trip - 52 weeks

At 12 months, Macie was wearing 6-9 month clothes and size 3 diapers. We did wear the occasional 12 month outfit.

Feeding:

This month Macie finished her transition to formula for milk. She continued to have some choking issues, so we continued to take food introduction slowly.

Solid foods introduced this month included:

Beef
Pasta
Bread
Goldfish crackers
Chocolate
Cake

Sleeping:

Except for teething nights, Macie continued to be a fantastic nighttime sleeper. She went to bed between 8:30pm - 9pm and slept until 7-8am in the morning. Most mornings, Macie and I would get 30-60 minutes of alone time before Ephram woke up to join us. It was nice, quiet time for us!

She played around with her naps during the day, thinking about dropping her morning nap and going down to just one daily nap. In the end she stuck to two naps, with the morning one decreasing to 30-60 minutes in length and the afternoon nap usually around 3 hours.

Macie slept in her crib. When she woke, she usually went back to sleep on her own in a minute or two. During the day she slept in her swing for naps.

Teething:

Macie cut teeth 9 and 10 just before she celebrated her first birthday. (Tooth 10 came through the day before!) She had six teeth on top and four teeth on bottom at the end of the month.

Communicating:

Macie loves to talk! She quickly added beginning-sound words for:

Block
Book
Mama
Dada
Brick (Legos)

She also continued to use a lot of gestures and a few official signs to communicate. Her best communication tool was her smile.

Favorites:

Playing with musical toys
Moving around the house on her own
Playing with Legos
Collecting cheerios on the counter
Getting her brothers to do things for her
Reading magazines
Sticking out her tongue
Smiling
Toy: Alphabet house blocks
Song: The Wheels on the Bus
Book: Pajama Time

Happy One Year Macie Drew! We made it!!!

Sunday, July 14, 2013

Her First Cake

Macie's first birthday fell on Easter weekend this year.

Which meant that it also corresponded with our Spring Break.

We invited just a few family friends to celebrate with us.

Every single one was either out of town, already committed to something for Easter or sick.

Every one except my parents,

Which is just about better than any other guest anyway.

Macie also had a cold on her birthday -

She's had quite a few since she quit nursing in January -

And I'm hoping that she's getting them all done with so that we can be healthy next year.

But, it was a nice and relaxing birthday.

We were able to give her plenty of time to discover her presents.

And plenty of breaks between activities.

And the very last activity was...

And, more importantly, this...

I love smash cakes.

But would Macie?

She started out all proper-like, in great girl fashion.

And then she was grabbing handfuls.

Pretty sure she preferred the frosting over the cake.

So she was probably happy when she managed to get the top layer to slide off,

Revealing another yummy layer of frosting.

After 20 minutes or so of cake-eating cuteness, it was time to clean my little girl off.

Once clean and jammied,

She went into her grandma's arms.

We had the perfect first birthday with our baby girl.

Monday, July 8, 2013

Macie Moves!

Now that we have passed this stage,
I will admit that I was a little bit worried.
My baby didn't crawl until she was 11 months old.
(9 months adjusted, but that is still late compared to Ephram!)

She finally started to inch along during the month of March.
At first she would scoot herself backwards and turn around in circles to get around.
Then, the army crawl began.
It was slow at first, and covered very short distances.

And then one day,
About a week after the army crawl began,
It wasn't so slow any more.
And she crawled across the whole kitchen.

Macie is such an all or nothing girl!
On her birthday she pushed up to fours, and did her first "traditional" crawl.

Love this little girl!

Friday, July 5, 2013

The Visitor

Macie's sleeping patterns are a dream.
Sure - she's not that easy to put down.
But once she goes to sleep,
She is usually out until the morning.
I often wake up to giggles,
And babbling,
And the crinkling noises of a mattress that is hosting a playing baby.

And for a couple of weeks,
On a few select mornings,
Squealing laughter.
Which would curiously be followed by "tickle, tickle, tickle" in another voice.

Macie had a visitor.

He would wake up,
And nothing makes me happier than knowing that
The first thing Ephram thought of upon waking was
His baby sister and
Making her happy.

One morning I caught him.
I heard a little murmured babbling from his room.
Then he tried to sneak down the hall,
Almost reaching her room,
And then he ran back really fast.
Slowing when he reached his doorway,
He hushed himself,
Picked up his step stool carefully,
And tip toed with it,
(While it frequently knocked against the wall,)
Through her door.
It was quiet for
Maybe 15 seconds.
Then I heard the best little chuckle,
And they started to talk.
A best friend, brother and sister, I'm going to love you forever kind of talk.

I was so happy,
So touched,
I just couldn't interrupt it.
(Okay, I cried a little too.)
And then, as quiet as I could,
It was my turn to sneak.
Down the stairs to the kitchen,
Where my camera sat on a counter,
Back upstairs,
And right outside her door.

He was entertaining her with a couple of toys on the crib rail,
And it was clear that he'd passed her quite a few toys too.