From the Beginning

I am so happy to provide this update on Camille: she is eating great and has decided to stop screaming in the evenings! God does answer prayers! I finally decided on Saturday that I was ditching the NICU feeding schedule--feeds every 3 hours, no more, no less--and was going with my gut. When Henry was a newborn, every time he would cry, I would try to nurse him first to see if he was hungry. If he was, he would eat and be content--if he wasn't, he would continue to fuss and I would try to figure out what else was wrong. With Camille, the NICU staff forbade any deviation from the strict "eat every 3 hours schedule" and so when we went home, I was afraid to deviate from that as well. On Saturday, however, I decided that the hospital's way obviously wasn't working too well for my baby, so I was going with my instinct and try to feed Camille based on her cues, not a schedule. Well, it worked like a charm, and she is much more content doing the "eat on demand" thing rather than the feeding schedule. It makes me feel terrible that we didn't try that sooner! She is eating way more than she did before--most of the time draining a 50 cc bottle, when we could barely get her to do a 40 cc in the past! Henry was always a difficult baby to "schedule", and I guess his baby sister is too. This just also makes me laugh to think that this is one more thing that our baby girl has decided to defy everyone on.

Camille enjoyed several fun visits from family members and friends this past weekend. On Friday, she got to see her Pops (Danny), her Granny (Jason's grandmom) and her Aunt Teresa (Jason's aunt). Then, on Saturday, she got to see her Uncle Brian, Aunt Sarah and buddy Luke (our very good friends who are more like family). Then, on Sunday, she got to see her Mopsy (my grandmom), Aunt Missy (my aunt) and Aunt Jena (my aunt). And of course, they all thought she was unbelievably adorable. :) She was very alert during all of the visits and enjoyed all of the holding. I finally got my baby who wants to be held! Lady hates being held, even though I got her to be my lap dog. Henry never liked being held much even as a baby, and certainly doesn't like it now--he's way too busy for that kind of stuff! I have to tackle him to get to hug and kiss him, which he thinks is a super fun game. But my Camille loves to be held, and will let you know when she is put down too prematurely for her taste!

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Several of you have asked to hear Camille's story from the very beginning, and so I have decided to dedicate several posts to that. I guess to really tell the full story on Camille, I have to start at the very beginning, the weekend I found out I was pregnant in October 2008. As some of you know, that weekend was crazy. I had taken a pregnancy test on Saturday morning, and thought that it was a positive result, but I also thought I could have just been seeing things, so I decided to wait to tell Jason until I could take another one. Then, later that day, Henry accidentally burned his hands while with my parents and Jason at my grandfather's house that was currently being remodeled. We were all frazzled from that experience--the trip to the emergency room, bandaged hands, etc.--but I just had to know if I was in fact pregnant. So on Sunday, I took another pregnancy test, and it was for sure positive. I told Jason, who I thought was going to faint, and we were a bit surprised, but very excited.

I had a pretty difficult pregnancy this time around. With Henry, I was hardly nauseated at all. With Camille, I was nauseated almost every day, and so very tired all the time. The exhaustion might have had more to do with a certain wild-man toddler more so than the pregnancy, but we'll blame the pregnancy instead. Then, also as most of you know, we had a terrible tragedy in January when my sweet mother-in-law, Sharon, passed away after a long, courageous battle with Ovarian Cancer. We had really, really hoped that Sharon would get to see the birth of this baby, and we were heartbroken that this baby would never get to meet his/her special Gigi. Two weeks after Sharon's passing, we found out we were having a girl. We were so excited--I had really thought it was another boy for some reason. We decided to name her Camille Lynne. Camille is a name Jason and I have both always loved, and Lynne is Sharon's middle name. I had so much fun getting ready for a girl! I have yet to lay eyes on a baby girl outfit that is not cute, and have really had to work hard not to buy every baby girl article of clothing that I see. We had fun painting Camille's room purple, and putting up a fun purple butterfly border to match.

The only thing that made me really nervous during my pregnancy is that I did not feel like my belly was ever "big enough". Nearly everyone I talked to during my pregnancy commented on how I did not look like I was as far along as I was. Plus, I had been much bigger with Henry. I really worked hard to dismiss this and not worry about it, though, because I had worried about everything under the sun with Henry, and was determined not to do that with this pregnancy. I did ask my OB about this several times at my prenatal appointments, and he said that things looked good. I was measuring on track; gaining weight steadily; and the baby was moving around well. There was not any indication that anything was wrong.

When I got to my third trimester, I decided that I wanted to have a 3D/4D ultrasound done at one of those places that does them purely to give you pictures of what your baby looks like in the womb. I had a good coupon, so I decided to go for it. I didn't tell Jason because I knew he would roll his eyes at me and tease me about spending money on such a frivolous thing. But, I knew this would be our last baby, and I thought it would be a fun thing that we were glad that I did later. Boy were we ever! The lady conducting the ultrasound spent a long time trying to get pictures of Camille, but was unable to, one because she was Frank Breech (with her legs up over her face) and two because I had such low amniotic fluid levels. I asked the ultrasound tech if the low fluid levels were something that I should be concerned about. She replied, "I'm not allowed to say anything 'medical' but if I were you, I would ask my doctor about that." The look on her face said everything, even if she herself could not. I rushed out and called my doctor right away.


I spoke with my OB's nurse, and told her what happened. She said that it was impossible to tell if I really did have low fluid levels if the levels weren't measured on the ultrasound, which they weren't. She assured me that everything was probably fine since I wasn't leaking fluid and since my measurements were on-track. I still felt uneasy, though, so I asked to reschedule my next appointment for an earlier date. This was Thursday; I was now set to come in on Monday.

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More later on my pregnancy/delivery later, but I will leave you with these adorable pictures that we took of Camille and our "firstborn" today. Can you believe how giant an 8 1/2 pound Yorkie looks next to her? I love the last one in the series! They had both had about enough of the photo shoot! Thank you for your continued prayers! Please don't forget about us, and keep praying for a miracle for Camille!