William's outing to the park

We took the dogs and William to the park today. The summers are beautiful up here! William is wearing the monogrammed t-shirt that Mecall sent him this week! Thanks Mecall :)

Nursery

I haven't shown pictures of the nursery yet so I thought I'd show our little guy's new room!

One week update

Yesterday we went for William's first appointment with the pediatrician. He did really well and slept through the whole thing! We really liked his pediatrician, Dr. Fox. He was very gentle with William and patient with us and helped calm a lot of our anxieties.

He wore his polo onesie that his aunt Mary Beth gave him and he looked so cute!

Here he is in his Georgia Tech paraphanalia...he looks so much like a Dart in this picture!

My mom left today but she helped out with his bath before she left. She has been such a huge help and support to us over the past two weeks and it was sad to have her leave. In fact, I cried for about an hour afterwards (Matt thinks I'm pretty hormonal!) I'm hoping she can come back really soon though.

This afternoon William enjoyed some good tummy time with daddy. It was really cute to see them bond!

At 7:10 tonight we sang happy birthday to him. I can't believe he is already a week old! He has come such a long way in the past week, and we love him more and more every day!

He is finally home!

We were able to bring William home yesterday afternoon! We are so excited to have him home with us.Here is a picture that the nurse took in NICU right before we left to go home. One of our first family photos of the three of us!

And here he is getting strapped into his car seat for the ride home!

So far he has been sleeping in the bassinet and seems to like it!

Today we attempted to give him a bath. He wasn't too happy about it, but seemed to like snuggling in his monkey towel afterwards.

William Pierce Dart

William Pierce Dart was born July 18 at 7:10pm and weighed 8 pounds 13 ounces and was 20 inches long.

The last time I blogged was Friday night, July 17th when I was already in labor, so I'll fill you in on the last few days. I received an epidural late Friday night. My contractions were getting more and more painful, and I wanted to be able to sleep a little that night. Early Saturday morning I was 3 cm dilated, and by 2pm I was 10 cm! My doctor got to the the hospital at 4pm, and that is when I started pushing. In the beginning it wasn't so bad, but my epidural was slowly wearing off, and by 6:30 I could feel everything and I was not a happy person! They called the anesthesiologist to come give me more, and waiting on him to get there seemed like pure torture! My doctor had said I would be allowed to push for 3 hours and then I'd have to make a decision between using forceps and getting a c-section. So at 7pm, when he still wasn't here, we decided to use forceps. I had been through a very rough two days of labor and hated to have a c-section at the last minute. So we waited on the anesthesiologist, and as soon as I had a little more pain medicine, I gave two more pushes with the forceps and he was here!

The next two hours were a blur. I remember telling the nurse over and over again that I just felt "out of it". I vaguely remember them bringing William over to me for a second before they whisked him away to NICU. Matt said I looked horrible - he said my lips were completely white and I looked like death warmed over. In the meantime, my family was in the waiting room and had no idea what was going on. Matt had texted them that William had been born, but they hadn't heard from him since then. Finally around 9:30 Matt took my family to see William in NICU while I was being taken to a different recovery room.

After I was situated in the new room, Matt went back to the NICU to see William and got to hold him and rock him for about an hour. Around midnight, once Matt was back in the room, a nurse came to help me get up to go to the bathroom. I told her I was feeling faint, and she told me to sit down in a chair. The next thing I knew, the room was full of nurses and a doctor and I was back on the bed. Apparently the nurse had been trying to get my attention and I was unresponsive, just starring ahead, so they called a "code blue" in my room. The doctor said it was probably due to preeclampsia. Preeclampsia causes you to have high blood pressure, so they give you an IV of magnesium for 24 hours after you give birth to lower your blood pressure and prevent seizures. Apparently my blood pressure had just gotten too low when I stood up. So the doctor told me to not get out of bed at all until 24 hours post delivery.

Sunday, my family came to see me for the first time since William had been born. They brought me flowers and balloons and stuffed animals! Also, Matt's dad flew in early Sunday morning just to see the baby! Matt brought me back lots of pictures from NICU, so I could see what he looked like. He had to be in NICU for several reasons. One is that he was born at 35 weeks, so they had to make sure he was ok. Since he is a premie, he wasn't interested in eating at all at first, so they had to give him a feeding tube. Also, newborn babies of diabetic mothers have a hard time controlling their own blood sugar at first, and his blood sugar kept getting too low so they had to give him an IV of glucose.

They finally took me off the magnesium IV at 7pm Sunday night, and told me that after a few hours I'd be allowed to get out of bed and take a wheelchair to NICU to see William! I was so excited! I'd been through a rough couple of days and hadn't even had a chance to hold my little man yet! It was amazing to get to hold him and talk to him!

Monday morning a doctor came by and said I'd be allowed to be discharged Monday night! Matt and I ordered the "Celebratory Meal" that the hospital gives new parents for lunch Monday. We then spent a lot of the afternoon in the NICU, and I was discharged around 8:30 Monday night. It was weird leaving the hospital to go home without William.

We spent most of Tuesday at the hospital again in NICU. The pediatricians told us that William had been off the feeding tube and the glucose IV all day, and he'd probably be able to leave Wednesday! So, we will be back at the hospital first thing tomorrow and hopefully we'll be bringing William home with us! We are so excited and we can't wait! I'll post more pictures soon.

Live from labor and delivery

Yesterday my blood pressure was really high and I was admitted into labor and delivery again. I spent the night last night at the hospital, and over night the symptoms of preeclampsia got worse and worse, so this morning the decision was made to induce me. I'm already having contractions and will get my epidural soon.

We are expecting this little guy to come either later tonight or tomorrow! It seems pretty unreal that the time has finally come.

We'll post pictures soon. Please keep us in your prayers!

18 years with diabetes

I was diagnosed with Type 1 diabetes 18 years ago today. I was 10 years old and it was the summer before 5th grade. My family had just been to Six Flags in Atlanta, and my parents said that every single time I passed a lemonade stand I would beg them for more lemonade. I remember earlier that summer making an entire pitcher of Crystal Light while my parents were at work during the day, and drinking the whole thing by the time they got home. I remember passing a vending machine while I was at the mall with my mom and begging her to let me get a drink (I know this is a weird thing to remember, but I guess it shows how desperately thirsty I really was). Type 1 diabetes (which is vastly different than Type 2 - typically what overweight adults get) is usually diagnosed in children, and the symptoms are weight loss and increased thirst. I had gotten extremely skinny that summer and just looked like skin and bones. At first my mom thought maybe I was just going through a weird growth spurt, but then she started to get a little concerned when she saw how weak I was. She said I could barely walk up the stairs to my room.

So on July 16, 1991, she took me to the doctor, thinking maybe I had an iron deficiency. The doctor took one look at me and knew right away. After a blood test, he explained that I had diabetes and I needed to go to the hospital. I wasn't scared...the only thing I knew about diabetes was that Stacy had it in The Babysitter's Club, and she seemed pretty cool. On the way to the hospital we stopped at my house to pack a few things, and I remember my dad coming home from work and coming up to my room and giving me a big hug. That was the first time I got scared.

I had no idea at the time how my life would be changed from that point forward. At the age of 10, I learned how to prick my finger to get blood 4 times a day, to give myself shot of insulin twice a day, and to be on a very detailed and specific diet that included no sugar. A lot of that has changed over the years...instead of shots I now have an insulin pump, which continuously gives me insulin 24 hours a day. And I still have to count every carbohydrate I eat, but my diet is not as detailed and I am allowed sugar.

Six months later we were celebrating Christmas at my grandmother's house and noticed my cousin Sarah had similar symptoms as I had had. We tested her blood sugar with my machine and sure enough, it was high. She spent Christmas in the hospital that year.

Wondering who else has Type 1? Halle Berry, Sharon Stone, Mary Tyler Moore, Jean Smart, Elliott Yamin, Bret Michaels, the lead singer of Jonas Brothers, and Randy Alcorn.

Baby picture

When Matt and I were about 6 months old, our parents got us together (our dads were fraternity brothers together in college) and for some reason snapped a picture of us sitting on a couch looking at each other. I don't think either one of our families thought another thing about that picture until Matt and I started dating our junior year of high school. We were pretty amazed to find out it existed!

I scanned the picture and then sent it to a company that will print your photograph on a canvas to hang on the wall. I thought it would be cute to hang this picture of Matt and I as babies in the nursery! I got it back this week and I am so happy with how it turned out!

Things are going well!

I had a really good doctor's appointment yesterday. My blood pressure was normal! It is good to know that maybe bed rest hasn't been pointless! Also, the NST showed that the baby is doing well and responding the way he should. He was asleep during the first 10 minutes of the test so they held a buzzer up to my stomach and he immediately jumped! Poor thing...it scared him! So if everything continues to go well, I may have a few more weeks to go.

My mom came up Sunday night to help me out this week while Matt is at work during the day. It is SO nice having her here! She helps out with so much...I currently hear her in the other room vacuuming!

I go for another NST on Thursday, and then I have another doctor's appointment next Monday. I will keep this updated if anything changes!

Good weekend and good eating at the Darts

We've had a pretty good weekend. Yesterday Matt went to the farmer's market and got some tomatoes, and then went to a Jewish bakery and picked up some challah bread (sooo good!). He made us tomato sandwiches for lunch with homemade mayo! They were SO good! For those of you not from the South, tomatoes with white bread and mayo are a staple during the summer.

Shayna, who goes to church with us, brought us dinner (which was awesome!), so Matt decided to make something new for dessert: profiteroles. They are basically a pastry filled with ice cream and then topped with ganache before serving. They were delicious. I know I've said it a million times, but I'm a lucky girl:)

Other than eating delicious food, Matt and I kept busy this weekend watching movies and hanging out with each other! We watched The Fugitive and Little Miss Sunshine that we'd tivo'd, and several episodes of two of Matt's favorites: Chopped and Cake Boss. 

Today I couldn't go to church with Matt so I listened to Francis Chan online. It is impossible to listen to him and not be convicted! By the way, Christian Audio is giving away one of my favorite books, Francis Chan's Crazy Love, on audio for free! If you haven't already read this book, download the audio and listen to it! It's awesome.

Matt went to the Cubs game tonight to watch Adam pitch. I was so sad I couldn't go! Matt took his friend Marc, though, and I'm sure they had a good time. I got to watch it on tv and Adam did great!