My baby is 1 today!

Today is Jocelyn's first birthday! I have been having mixed feelings about it all week. I can't believe that she is already 1, but at the same time I can't remember my life without her. I keep thinking about the first time that I held her and how I didn't think that I could love something so small so much.

There are no words to describe how much I love this little girl. I could go on for days about all of the little things that I love about her. I love her beautiful blue eyes. I love how much she loves babies and little children and how she always wants to hug them. I love her HUGE smile. I love when she snuggles up to me right before I put her to bed. I love how much she loves music, she will either dance or sing along when she hears it. I love how friendly she is and that she will let just about anyone hold her. I love when her face lights up as soon as her Daddy walks in the door. (she is such a Daddy's girl) And the list goes on.

I just know that I am truly blessed that this amazing child chose me to be her Mommy.

Happy Birthday Bug!!

Mommy loves you so much.

(remember to pause the music in the right hand column)

Photo and video editing at www.OneTrueMedia.com

One Year Ago... October 16th

Well the day was finally here. My due date!!

After being sent home from the hospital the night before I was determined to not go again until I was absolutely sure that this baby was coming. Since I was still having regular contractions Brent and I both decided that we would take the day off of work. I didn't have much sleep since the contractions hadn't really stopped but I was toughing it out. I made sure that I had everything that I would need in my hospital bag, I triple checked the nursery to make sure I didn't need any last minute things, and I waited.

At about 7:00 pm I had my dad and bro-in-law come and give me a blessing, that I would be able to handle all of the labor and the delivery and that both Jocelyn and I would make it through healthy. I remember shortly after they left I was walking down the hall to my bedroom when a contraction hit me. It was so painful that I needed Brent to come and help me stay on my feet. That was when I knew that it was time to go. We gathered all of our things and headed to the hospital again.

We arrived at the hospital and I was again set up in a triage room to monitor my labor. The funny thing was that it was the same room and the same nurse as the night before. After I was hooked up to the monitors the nurse checked to see how much I had dilated...... I was at a 5 almost 6cm. I was so happy when the nurse said to me "oh yeah you are definitely having this baby tonight."

So I was admitted to the hospital and set up in a labor and delivery room. They ran my IV and I had my epidural within about half an hour. It was great. Shortly after my doctor came in and broke my water. He informed us that there was some meconium in the fluid so they would have to have the people from pediatrics on hand when she was born to make sure that there weren't any problems. After that I was finally able to sleep. I slept for about 2 hours, then the nurse came to check me and I had dilated to an 8, I was almost there. A little while later I started to feel like I should push so we called in the nurse and she told me that I was complete but that she needed to go call the doctor. Since it was about 3:00 am at this point it was going to take the doctor a little while to get there.....

After about an hour of pushing she was here.

Immediately after she was born they took her to get cleaned up and to check that there were no complications. While monitoring her heart rate they determined that it was going a little too fast so they let me hold her for a few minutes and then took her immediately to the nursery. They had to set her up on a c-pap machine for about an hour to monitor her breathing and heart rate.

Luckily everything was ok. So she finally got her first bath.





All clean and ready to go meet Mommy & Daddy!

One Year Ago... October 15th

One year ago today it was the day before my due date and since I woke up that morning feeling completely normal (other than being extremely huge pregnant) I went to work. The morning started out like any other morning at work just answering the phones and taking care of things.....until I noticed I was have a few contractions, they weren't very regular and not painful at all so I ignored them. When I started paying more attention to them I realized that they were coming every 15 minutes. I kept track of them for the rest of the morning and since they hadn't stopped by lunch time I decided to go home and have a nap (in my pre-natal class I learned that if contractions stopped during sleep than it wasn't true labor). I woke up after napping for almost 2 hours and the contractions had stopped, I was so dissapponited. So I decided that I would go hang out at my sister's house for the evening since there was still no baby. After arriving at Nicole's house the contractions started again, only this time they were coming every 10 minutes lasting longer and becoming more intense and painful. I was hoping so badly that this would be it. After several hours of regular contractions (still only about 7 or 8 minutes apart) I decided to head home. I told Brent that we may be heading to the hospital sometime that night so he decided to go to bed and try to get some sleep before anything major happened. I kept timing my contractions which were steadily getting closer and increasingly more painful and uncomfortable. At about 1:00 am the contractions were coming about every 3-5 minutes so I decided that it was time to go to the hospital. I woke Brent up and told him that we better go. At this point I was so nervous yet so excited that it was finally time. We arrived at the hospital and they set me up in a triage room to monitor my contractions to see if I was really in labor. The nurse measured me and I was dilated to a 3 (only 1cm more than the day before). The nurse told me that they would have to keep me in triage for an hour to see if I progressed any further.

An hour later the nurse came back to check me, I was only at 3.5cm dilated. She told me that it still wasn't enough to admit me but she would give me another hour to see if I could dilate further.

Another hour later she came back to check me and I was still at 3.5cm. I was so bummed. She told me that I hadn't progressed enough so they would have to send me home, which was the last thing I wanted to hear. They gave me a couple of percocet to help me sleep and sent me on my way.

So back home I went..........still pregnant.

One Year Ago... October 14th

One year ago today I was preparing to go to my 40 week doctors appointment it was a Tuesday and only 2 days until my due date. I was so beyond anxious to have this baby. I went to the doctor hoping to be dilated to at least a 3 so I could feel like I was making some sort of progress. When the doctor finally checked me I had only dilated to a 2, I was so disappointed so I asked her to strip my membranes hoping that it would help speed things along because at that point I was desperate to try anything to induce labor.

Later that night I began feeling a little bit of cramping, I hoped so badly that this was a sign and this baby was on her way. Sadly it was not the case, I went to bed that night feeling the same way I did the night before, like nothing had changed.

One Year Ago... October 13th

One year ago today was just another typical Monday I went to work and I couldn't help but keep thinking that I would be pregnant forever. I was 3 days away from my due date and I still had no signs of labor. By this time I was going to the doctor every week and the previous week the doctor had measured me and I was only dilated to a 1. I still had a long way to go. I was so scared that I would go over my due date and have to be induced which was the last thing that I wanted since the doctor didn't have me scheduled for an induction until the 24th (an entire week after my due date). I was nervous for my next doctors appointment the following day knowing that I might not be progressing at all. I remember feeling like our Jocelyn's birthday would never come.

One Year Ago... October 12th

Since this Saturday is Jocey's first birthday I decided that I would do a post each day to kind of document everything that happened and how I remember feeling just "one year ago today".

One year ago today I was "patiently" waiting for a sign that our little girl would be joining us soon. So far there had been no contractions and no clear sign that she was on her way. I remember feeling anxious for anything to happen I wanted so badly to be done being pregnant and move into the next stage of my life as a mother.