excited/nervous/anxious/scared/happy

25 weeks today! 

each day i become more and more excited/nervous/anxious/scared/happy about little david's arrival. at my last appointment, it was so nice to hear that he was doing so well that we wouldn't have to go back for another month. the waiting is killing me now! i wish i could have a constant update on everything he's doing in there :P i have sooooo many questions/concerns, and just random thoughts going through my mind 24/7 so i thought i would post a few of them here. PLEASE comment if you have any suggestions, thoughts, or ideas for us :) 

hospital stay needs.

• snap-up outfits. he will need to wear these so they can access tubes, wires, etc. easily. 
• blankets. remember that when they change the bedding they could end up in the hospital laundry and you might not see them again. same with clothes. 
• socks, hats, mittens. these will keep him warm, and also help prevent him from pulling on tubes and lines.
• journals. to help document everything that is happening with surgeries, appointments, etc. 

my hospital bag.

• have packed by 30 weeks, just in case. 
• stuff to keep me busy. laptop, books, journal, etc. 
• extra digital camera? maybe the staff could take pictures for us when we can't be around him.
• a picture of daddy and mama to put in NICU with david.  

bonding with baby.

• kangaroo care. direct skin-to-skin contact with parent. 
• hold him as much as possible. possibly restrict visitors from holding him? only let the medical staff, and daddy and mama hold him since he will be in a fragile state and since we won't be able to start bonding right from birth. 
• get involved with everything. find out what each tube means to which pacifier he likes best. 
• teddy bears. start sleeping with a few stuffed animals before he's born and take them to the NICU with us. david can sleep with them and smell his daddy and mama. 

unanswered questions/would love more answers and opinions.

• what extras should i pack in our hospital bag? especially since it could be a potentially long stay.
• when will he be able to drink breast milk? 
• where can i find cute snap-ups? i'm having a hard time finding any. 
• did you stay at a ronald mcdonald house? 
• when will he be able to wear clothes? 
• did you have a hard time leaving your pets? my cats are my kids. i know i will love baby david so much more, but it still pains me to think about leaving them for a long time.
• how did you bond with your baby? did you let visitors hold him/her? 
• will we be doing his laundry? or does the hospital wash clothes/blankets for us? 
• are there more gastro complications the longer you wait in your pregnancy? 

i've just started volunteering with avery's angels, and i look forward to helping others and also learning as much as possible.

so i guess that's it for now! hopefully we can learn from this post, and also help someone else going through the gastroschisis journey. for a smile, here's a little note from my unborn baby, it was waiting for me on the computer screen. apparently he is already very tech-savvy. have a happy day! 

la vita e bella

over a year ago, i decided that i was going to tell my best friend how i really felt about him. i invited him over to drink beer and watch jeopardy (our usual). i was so nervous about telling him with the fear that he wouldn't feel the same way, or that it could ruin our friendship. as i was gathering the liquid courage to tell him, he beat me to it. he told me how he had been in love with me for a long time, how he knew he wanted to spend his life with me, and then we had our first kiss :) 

two months ago, we said "i do," and this has been the happiest/craziest/scariest two months of my life. we found out in june that we are going to be first time parents, and we couldn't be happier. 

within our first month of marriage, matt and I found out that our little boy would be born with gastroschisis, a birth defect that affects 1 in 10,000 babies. gastroschisis is a defect that allows the intestines, and sometimes other organs, to protrude outside the abdominal cavity.

 each case is different, and our baby may spend anywhere from one to several months in the NICU depending on the severity and complications that he may have. the same week we got the awful call from the doctor, i had surgery on my armpit to remove a "third boob" i was apparently growing, joy! :P 

so in the last two months, i have learned that 

we have a very tough and challenging road ahead of us. but as long as i have my best friend by my side, i know that there is absolutely nothing that we can't overcome as long as we have each other, and everything will make us stronger people/parents in the end. 

as for baby david, i know that he's already a little fighter, and is gonna be one tough cookie, just like mama and daddy.