Sadie Hope

Happy 2nd birthday Sadie! This is a bit early (her birthday is the 16th) but we are going to be leaving for California, plus Valentines Day, plus Emma (17th) and Eli's (22nd) birthdays, I gotta spread it all out a little.

Sadie came into the world through a tramatic delivery, after a scary pregnancy. Her middle name has a lot of meaning to us as it was chosen because that's what we lived on during my last trimester. It's a story that is long when I tell it because all the details start coming back to me. Plus it was just a long ordeal. Feel free in skip through it if you want.

Sadie got all the recessive genes in our family. Being so small is one of them (Dana's family). She didn't grow very big when I was carrying her and the specialized OB told us she thought Sadie may have a proportional dwarfism. I asked if it could be partly my active arthritis which wasn't leaving during the pregnancy as it always had in the past and she said no (later I read a study that has shown active arthritis to cause some growth restriction). I went in weekly to get monitored. Sadie had endless ultrasounds where they would watch her bloodflow in her brain and look for other signs of distress. She always looked healthy but small. That oh-so-special doctor wanted to deliver Sadie at 32 or 33 weeks solely based on her size. Since Sadie always looked healthy I couldn't understand the logic and we switched to a new perinatalogist. The new doctors gave us a lot more hope (hence the name) and said he didn't believe that she had a dwarfism.
I went in at 39 weeks to get induced. I would've waited til I started labor but they said small babies have a higher risk of still birth.

2 days prior Sadie had been head up so they needed to turn her first. But when they did the ultrasound she was head down. Yeah! I was skeptical though and even asked to talk to the doctor about whether she could turn back the other way again since she was small and had plenty of fluid. He assured me that, that is super rare. Induction began, which went like clockwork. I got the epidural and was ready to push. The nurse couldn't feel her head. This was after me asking probably 10 times during the course of labor if she was sure she was head down. They went and got an ultrasound machine which wouldn't work for 10 mins or so. Finally they confirmed she had turned back around. They left to get the doctor to see what we should do. I just knew I wanted her out. I felt really weird and lightheaded.

The doctor presented us with a few options but then had to leave to deliver another baby. After that we were alone in the room and Dana and I just looked at each other in shock and disbelief at the situation and that we were in there alone when I NEEDED to get her out. A moment later 3 nurses ran in and asked where our nurse was (great question), they weren't picking up Sadie's heartrate anymore. Then our nurse comes back in and announces that they shouldn't worry, she's being a stinker and keeps moving her heart away from the monitor (maybe because she wasn't head down?) The monitor was picking up my heartrate. Then they noticed I was bleeding. My placenta had ruptured because I was ready to push for more than half an hour. Really bad news for my baby whose heartrate they already couldn't find. We didn't find that out until after she was born- the nurse had said it was blood from the plug.

I started crying and begging them to get her out. They rushed me to the OR in case the doctor would want to give me a C-section. I guess he was still delivering the other baby. A new nurse who I believe saved Sadie's life, checked for the baby's wiggly heartrate. She then annouced that "my" heartrate was actually the baby's (too slow for a baby). She said "We have got to get her out right now!" A doctor was called and they had her out in about 3 minutes. She was not breathing, she didn't cry. I saw Dana crying over her as they were trying to recessitate her. My emotions were dulled from the epidural and morphine and I felt like I was watching the scene but not part of it. Dana remembers them picking up her arm and watching it fall back down. They asked him to tickle her feet. He saw her toe move. She began to breathe. They let me see her and then took her to the NICU. She was there for a week but just for jaundice. They took her off oxygen the day she was born. How grateful are we that she survived that with no lasting effects. I worried about that for about the first year of her life. I don't worry anymore. She's happy and healthy and we are SO grateful for her.

Not the greatest quality but this is Amy, me and Sadie, and mom in the NICU
She was 4 lbs. 6 oz. at birth. 16 inches. To me, this photo best shows how little she was. This is the day we brought her home. She had to sit on rolled up diaper cloths to fit into her carseat. Emma had barely turned 7 and her hand can cover her head.
A lady in my ward had preemies and told me to be sure to take a picture next to a doll. I'm so glad she did. This is one of my favorites.

Blessing Day

I still can't get over her blue eyes and blonde hair. I love how bright they look next to the brown eyes (which I also love of course).

Happy baby!!! 7 months
So much love from her sisters and brother :)

Some awesome things about this girl are:

Her adorable babytalk that I can't get enough of

She's an expert nose-blower which I really enjoy (my first one)

She's cuddley

She's so sweet and hasn't started into tantrums yet

She's happy and loves to play!

Boy, do I ever kiss and enjoy this girl each day of her life.