4 Years

Well, besides being Steve's birthday today, it's also James' and my anniversary. Hard to believe it's been 4 years already. (We're getting old!) Today I found an old email I had forgotten I'd written to one of my missionary companions right after Sam was born. Maybe it's because I'm all pregnant and hormonal, but I couldn't read it without crying and I thought it was a fitting thing to accidentally find on our anniversary. We still feel like we're sort of "in the thick of it" with James being crazy busy and working so hard, but reading this today reminded me of how far we've come already and how thankful I am for all his hard work for us. Here's the letter ...

Hi Punim,

Sorry it's taken me so long to get back to you. Thank you for the baby clothes, that was so thoughtful of you. Your timing was incredible. We were expecting the baby in March, but instead he surprised us on January 21st!!! Now I know you’re dying to hear a long-winded labor story, right?

Here it goes:

The 21st was a Sunday morning. I woke up at 7:50am feeling a little crampy, but the baby had just turned head down earlier that week so I thought it was just that the Braxton Hicks contractions were feeling stronger in his new position. I told James I felt yucky and was gonna soak in the tub for awhile before church. He came in later and decided he wanted to time my "Braxton Hicks contractions." I laughed at him and thought he was being over zealous from our child birth prep classes we had just started. He told me they were lasting a minute and were a minute apart (you're supposed to go to the hospital when they're 5 minutes apart - woops.) Anyway the contractions were getting stronger and I decided if they were hurting me then they were probably bugging the baby too, so I reluctantly decided to go sit at the hospital and make sure everything was ok. (Of course I had to put on make up and do my hair first.) My mom asked if she should go with us. I told her no - that they were just gonna tell me "that's normal" like every other shocking thing that happens to your body during pregnancy and send me home. (I found out later James was behind me mouthing, “YES, you need to come with us!”)

I was irritated because I was tired and hurting and didn't want to spend my Sunday at the hospital. I was also worried they would tell me to take it easy or suggest bed rest which is hard to think about when you're the only one bringing home a paycheck till the end of the semester. By the time we got in the car it was hurting more and more. I was starting to get worried about the baby in there. I thought maybe they’d have to give me a shot or something to stop it. The hospital is about 30 minutes away. When we pulled into the parking lot I puked like I have never puked before – I sounded like I was possessed!!! There were no wheel chairs at the door so we walked across the first floor to the elevators. I guess the people inside were in a hurry because right before we got there the doors closed – jerks! When we finally got to labor and delivery on the third floor I went to the front desk and told them I was having contractions (it was probably about 9:30am by that time.) The nurse kinda scared me because before I even finished my sentence she was calling a triage nurse. She picked up the phone and said in a forced-calm voice, “I have a mom here having contractions AND SHE’S SHAKING REALLY BAD.” James told me later I was completely white.

They hooked me up to monitors – the baby’s heartbeat was good, yay! She was looking at my contractions on the screen. I was getting pretty inpatient and said, “Can’t you give me something to stop this?” She said, “Well, that depends on how far you’ve progressed.” That was the first time I realized those were real labor pains – I wasn’t just being a whimp. I decided right then that if this is what early labor pains were like then I was definitely gonna get an epidural when I really did go into labor (in March of course.) The nurse checked my cervix and said pitifully, “Oh, Honey, you’re 9 centimeters … you’re gonna have a baby today.” I, of course, began to cry and completely freak out. I was only 33 weeks pregnant. I had just finally started “showing.” (I weighed more on my mission than the day I gave birth!) They wheeled me into a delivery room (a wheelchair – fancy that) and made me lay down which hurt a lot worse than standing up and leaning on James. Then they spent what felt like an eternity asking me the Stupidest questions like my address and phone # and all that crap – supposedly I was already registered at that hospital, but I think they just wanted to torture me.

I was so scared and hopeless – I had no idea what babies were like born 7 weeks early. I didn’t know if he would live or if there would be lots of things wrong with him. I finally asked if I could have anything for the pain. They told me it was too late and that it wouldn’t be safe for the baby. So I asked how long before I could start pushing. That finally made her stop asking me silly questions. She said, “You feel like you want to push???” … Duh! I still wonder how long they would’ve let me lay there squirming around before they let me push, I was 9 centimeters dilated when I got there for heaven’s sake. She checked my cervix and said, “OH, you’re ready! But don’t push, wait for the doctor.”

Yes, Camilla, it really does hurt … bad. But looking back, I think if it was a normal birth and I wasn’t so scared for my poor little baby it would’ve hurt less. It really is doable. Luckily my sweet boy was faster than a speeding bullet and I only had to push for 15 minutes. (The draw back to having him come out so quick was that I had an episiotomy, and STILL “tore” in the front … didn’t you want to know that?) My awesome little kid was born at 10:51am. I had no idea what to expect, but he really looked perfect – and it wasn’t just blurry hormonal mommy vision, everybody was surprised at how great he looked. He was bright pink with chubby cheeks and a thick head of dark hair. He didn’t even look like a scrawny preemie. He looked like a normal, plump baby – just in miniature. He was 17.5 inches long and 4 pounds 11.5 ounces (about a pound more than the average at that age!) He let out a good cry and then started sucking on his arm. The doctor handed him to a neonatal nurse who (BLESS HER HEART) set him on my chest for about 2 seconds so I could kiss him and see him open his eyes for the first time. Then, of course they had to whisk him off, which I totally expected. He looked so great I was sure they would be back with him in a few minutes and I would get to take him home. (Yeah, obviously I didn’t read much about preemies when I was pregnant. I just was having a totally normal pregnancy, this was the last thing I ever thought would happen!) James got to follow them with the baby, and as soon as they said it was ok for my mom to go I told her to go too. When they got back James was smiling and nodding his head at me. He said, “He’s good, he’s gonna be alright.” But he looked too happy, like he was trying too hard to convince me. The baby looked so good when I saw him I thought I didn’t have to worry anymore. Then I saw my mom and it looked like she had been crying. The neonatologist came in right behind them. He told me there was nothing wrong with the baby, but because he was so early he was having too much trouble breathing on his own. They call it respiratory distress syndrome. The poor little babies spend so much energy breathing they burn too many calories and go downhill fast. The doctor told me he was hooked up to a machine to help him breathe and they would have to transfer him to a level 3 hospital in Sacramento.

I got to go down right away to see him. They wheeled me right up to him and the nurse that had handed him to me explained all his new “equipment.” When I look back at the pictures from those first few days, they break my heart. His tiny little body had so much “machinery” on it. But I guess because I had spent the last two years working at the clinic and assisting with surgeries, I expected a lot worse. When they told me he was on oxygen I thought he would be on a ventilator, but instead he had a CPAP. Because he was breathing on his own he didn’t need a ventilator to breathe FOR him, but because his tiny lungs were not supposed to be breathing air yet, they would collapse when he would exhale, so it made it that much harder each time he had to take another breath. The CPAP goes over their head and smashes their little piggy nose up and blows continuous positive air pressure to keep their lungs from deflating. He had an iv that took up his whole little arm, a central line from his umbilical cord, 3 monitors on his torso, one on his heel, and the other heel was bandaged from all the blood draws. He had a heater above him to keep him warm. He was so tough, every time someone would bother him he let out a little grunt or squeak and a wiggle to protest. James and I were still deciding between two names, but when I saw him there I decided his name was Sam. (Samuel Joseph Holden.) I couldn’t hold him, so I just leaned forward in my wheelchair and wrapped my arms around him like a hug as best as I could. I stayed like that with my face next to him and talking to him until the transport team came to take him away.

It’s really amazing the things they can do for these babies. They sent a neonatologist, a neonatal nurse, and a respiratory therapist to be there with him the whole ambulance ride. I got to stay there with him while the doctors and nurses gave their reports on his condition to the transport team and they hooked him up in his little space capsule. It wasn’t until the elevator doors closed and he was out of my sight that I lost it. All my mommy hormones kicked in full force and I HAD to be with my baby … NOW. They brought me to my recovery room and I told them I either needed to be released as soon as possible or I needed to be transferred to the hospital where my baby went. They told me it would be better to just rest and if everything went well I could be released tomorrow. They said that usually the paperwork to approve a transfer takes longer than getting well enough to be released. I asked them to start it just in case. Miracle of miracles, the same ambulance that took Sam to Sacramento turned right around and got me. The nurses said they’d NEVER seen it happen that fast.

Since he had an iv he wasn’t ready to eat for awhile so I started pumping breastmilk drop by drop every 2 hours 24 hours a day to try and get a decent milk supply. My sister in law flew out from Springville and got us a motel room close to the hospital (it was 60 to 90 minutes away from our house depending on traffic.) I couldn’t be with Sam all the time because it was such a high level of intensive care at that hospital. But I could go every 3 hours for his feedings. At first it was just my colostrum through a tube down his throat, then it was feeding tiny amounts of breastmilk from a bottle. I didn’t sleep for two days, and after that I didn’t sleep much. (Adrenaline is an amazing thing.) Leaving him over and over was the most agonizing thing I’ve ever done in my life. James still had school, so he came as much as he could, but we were separated a lot. Nighttime was the worst. I couldn’t relax enough to fall asleep, then when exhaustion finally took over I had to get up every couple hours to hook myself up to a cow machine when all I wanted to do was hold my baby. After a day or so he didn’t need the CPAP anymore. He got to have a little nasal canula instead and they slowly decreased the amount of oxygen he got from it each day until it was eventually just room air. By Thursday he didn’t need any help breathing, and we got the ok to transfer him back to the hospital he was born at.

That made things much easier. James would drop me off at the hospital in the morning on his way to school and pick me up after school. We would have lunch together, then he would do homework and I would go back to the hospital until late at night. At this hospital they didn’t have to kick me out every 3 hours, so I stayed with him all the time. Other than a few bouts of jaundice he was just working on getting bigger and stronger. Sam had a hard time figuring out how to suck, swallow, and breathe all at the same time. It was tough to see him trying so hard when he was so tired, and more and more was expected of him each day. On February 10th after the LONGEST 3 weeks of my life we finally got to take our baby home. He was 5 pounds 4 ounces.

Now he’s 3 and a half months old and must be pushing 12 pounds, I can’t believe how fast he grows. Every morning I wake up and he’s bigger. I know becoming a mother is always an amazing experience, but I always feel especially amazed because of how far we’ve come. What an interesting blessing to see what your baby would have been doing in your belly the last two months of your pregnancy. I’m still amazed at what unmistakable personalities they have right from the beginning even when they’re not done cooking yet. I think going through the anguish of being without my baby has made me so much more thankful. When I was pregnant I was worried about having to get up all night with a baby, and having it need you 24 hours a day. After he was born I realized I would have given anything to be woken up in the middle of the night by my baby instead of an alarm telling me to pump milk, and I found out that I needed him 24 hours a day at least as much as he needed me. Sam has completely taken over our lives like the good Lord intended him to. He’s doing lots of smiling and laughing now, and I’ve discovered it’s physiologically impossible for any human being not to laugh or at least smile at that. James and I always planned on me being a stay at home mom, but then real life happened. We had a baby on the way, and if we wanted to have a future we needed James to get through school as quickly as possible. We hoped we could figure out a way for me to not have to work, but I wondered if we really had a choice. Now we realize we don’t have a choice. That me leaving Sam to go to work is not worth any amount of money. James is still going to school full time and has a paid internship as an engineering assistant. I have no idea how he’s able to do it all, and neither does he. It’s like on your mission when you do your tiny little part and Heavenly Father makes up the difference by blessing you with extra … whatever. Life is crazy. I’m still clueless, but I can’t believe how much I’ve learned already. So don’t forget to let me know when you and Victor are expecting, I have lots of advice!!! ;)

Thanks again for the gift and just for keeping in touch. I really do miss you. You don’t meet friends like you very often, and it sucks we’re spread out all over the country. We were supposed to live next door to eachother, remember? I love you, Punim.

-Sista Bebo :)

Good Stuff

This probably won't mean much to anyone else, except maybe James will appreciate it some. I just got home from class, my capstone research class. We've been going through the process (since Fall) of doing research from framing a question to data analysis & reporting. We just got into a data set from a national longitudinal study a few weeks ago, and tonight we were to come to class ready to talk about what we would do with the data, what variables we would consider, how we would represent them, and what sort of analysis would answer our question of interest. Our question is What is the effect of Latino teachers on Latino students' achievement? We got to consider what our regression model would look like, and what the interactions would be between variables, and why. Although my initial model wasn't complete (I knew it wasn't, because I ran out of time), I was thinking correctly, and given time I think it would have been almost there. One of the things I hadn't yet considered were the interactions. It was very exciting to collaborate on writing the model (James, yes, it is a mathematical model and we were writing it on the whiteboard). My confidence in being able to think and represent it really grew tonight. If you want to see my eyes light up, watch me while we're doing something like this. I could have stayed for another few hours.

Why I want pie crust ...

I figured I'd better post this before everyone killed me when we had a baby and forgot to say anything. We found out I was pregnant at Christmas so it was a little soon to say anything, and then ... time just kinda flies, I guess! So here's the little biscuit at 11 weeks. I'm now 12 weeks and should have some new ultrasound pictures next week. I went to the doctor last week for something totally unrelated to the pregnancy, and with Kaiser no matter what you need to be seen for, if you're pregnant, they send you to an o.b. So since I hadn't had an ultrasound yet the gal decided to go ahead and check on the baby while I was there. It wasn't my regularly scheduled appointment so I had Sam with me, which actually turned out to be really neat. He's been a super good boy about going to the doctor with me, and really patient about waiting as long as there's some books or toys or a table and chairs he can play with. (Regardless of what I bring from home for him to play with, it's just not good enough at the doctor!) Anyway, they have to turn off the lights to do the ultrasound so they were worried Sam would be scared. I just pulled him up on the table with me and he watched the baby on the "t.v." It was really neat to see him so excited; "A baby! A baby!" I had to keep looking around his big head to see it! Now he loves looking at the pictures of the "baby" and telling the story of how we saw it on "t.v." at the "doctor." Hopefully we'll know in April if it's a boy or a girl, and we should get to meet her/him in August. :)

Good things come in small blessings

Well Friday morning came and I went to my appointment with the surgeon and the rep from Precision . The Surgeon took out the stitches and then the tech went to work. As he brought the stimulator power on and started to program it, I felt for the first time in 6 years a glimmer of hope. I have been waiting for 2 years to get this technology installed into my body just so I can try it out to see if it would work, and now is the awakening of the technology and it is blocking the pain signals that for 6 years have been tormenting me. The bliss that I have felt and the training time since, trying to get the level dialed in to block the pain but not feel the pulses, have been fun. Isn't it a wonder that God knows just what you need but allows you the trials to prepare yourself for the receipt of the wonders of his love and blessings. Even though Man "made the advancements" God has had his hand in everything being developed. He has placed the right people in the right places to be able to intelligently research and develop the wondrous machines and medicines necessary to enhance the lives of his children.

I Love the Lord so much and am so thankful for his involvement in this whole process. I have been so blessed lately that I can scarcely hold in the happiness I feel. Since leaving the military I have tried to make my life conform to the way the Lord and the Savior would like me to be. He blessed me with Sue and thusly with two wonderful new sons. With the two blessings I had already, that made my life so full and robustly happy. Now as the years that have passed, I have been blessed with more loved ones in the form of three wonderful daughters-in-Law that I see in my eyes as new Daughters. My Life I know will still contain more trials and struggles, but I rellish the struggles to overcome them because I know that they will ultimatly make me stronger in life and stronger spiritually.

Thank You Father for your Love in my life.

Playing 'Up'

As you can see, I've been in some intense thinking modes. I just applied for a Doctoral Fellowship, a cash award to assist doctoral students with their research. It is a competitive process, where you submit your application, and wait until Spring to hear if you've been chosen from among the candidates. Whenever I'm involved in intense writing/thinking academically, I learn new things about myself. Here's my latest thought (besides 3rd time's the charm):
When I was a kid, I dreamed of being heroic. I read biographies--every one with the blue denim cover in the school library--of famous people who made a difference. That's the kind of hero I wanted to be.
While that's who I wanted to be, I had a lot of fears that held me back. What if people found I wasn't really smart? What if I couldn't perform? If I couldn't do it perfectly, I didn't want to try, at least not in public. I missed a lot.
Having a marriage fail amid a relationship dynamic that was toxic to self-worth changes a lot. Failing at a very important life and eternal task led me to rethink and rebuild who I was. As the marriage ended, I had developed a new strength that began with understanding my worth to God. I determined that I could try new things. If you don't try, you'll never know what you can do.
This carried over into my teaching career, to a point.
Let me stray for a moment into a sports metaphor to help illustrate the core of my recent thinking. In High School, Freshmen generally are restricted to Freshmen teams and aren't allowed on Junior Varsity or Varsity teams, at least in my era. A few kids who are really good, are invited to 'play up'. When you are invited to play up, there is the very real chance that you won't see much action. The choice, then, is to stay with your lower level team, but be a star, or play up, but risk being overshadowed and even outplayed by the older players while you're learning. Guess who has the opportunity to learn more? Yep, the one playin 'up'. They get to test themselves against better players. More resistance over time builds muscle.
I realized recently that my style has been to stick with what I know, to stay with the Freshmen. The old adolescent fears kept me from becoming the person making a difference. Ever since coming to Utah, I've been coming closer to leaving the fear of failure behind for good. In my doctoral program, I'm finally 'playing up'.

3rd time's the charm

'Third time's the charm' as the saying goes. But what makes the 3rd time lucky? I was thinking about my 'lucky' 3's. It took me 3 times of starting my Bachelor's degree to finally finish it. I started at BYU as a 17 year old, a little later at CSU Sacramento until I got pregnant with James, and then finally finished after the divorce--graduating in 1986. Same for my Master's. One start for School Psychology/MFCC, a second for Educational Administration, and finally, the completed degree in Educational Technology. Significantly, Steve is my third try at marriage. So is it all 'luck', a 'charm'?
Luck connotes something whimsical or out of control of anyone. I am certain that in all of the cases of being successful on the 3rd try, volition was involved, and therefore luck was, well, out of luck. What was operational in all of the examples given was choice, hope, and perseverance.
With my Bachelor's degree, I chose to begin, and chose an environment that was nurturing to my awakening spirituality. I also chose to take a moratorium, afraid to make a mistake in my choice of career. But I also had hope that I would eventually figure out my path, and I would return to continue my education. Before I knew James was going to be born, I felt it was time to forge that path. I still did not know which direction to go, but the hope for a future of fulfillment was guiding me to that choice. When I found out I was expecting, I continued my plan to return to school, knowing it would only be for a semester, again with hope that my opportunity would come in the future. At that season, I chose to mother my children.
The connection between choice, hope, and perseverence for me is this: whether our choices lead us in the direction we had thought, or in some other way, a vision or goal will keep us focused with hope. By keeping that positive vision and joining that vision with perseverance, we make that 'charm' occur.
So third time's the charm? No. The third time is simply often the culmination of choosing not to give up, having hope for the important goal to be fulfilled.

Steve Here

Well the Stimulator is in and if it works as well as it did on the table I am going to be so happy next Friday when they turn it on permanently.
First they gave me a Spinal Block, which numbs you from the injection site down, so I could be awake for the whole thing. then they gave me some sedation so I wouldn't be anxious. That just made me loopy. I sang and hummed the whole time. I bet they thought me quite mad. After the y opened me up the Surgeon nipped off pieces of the Lamina so that he could have better access to place the wire. The wire is like the one Josh showed me in the beginning except that it had a paddle at the end of it that had 16 contacts on it. when the surgeon placed the wire then the Precision tech fired up the unit to see how well and how close she could get to the final program. She and the surgeon workes together until I was tingling from Paddle placement point to my big toes. She then turned it off and the surgeon placed the unit inside my right side. The tech then turned it back on and made sure everything was still working and then turned it off.
That was the neatest operation that I have ever been able to observe. I stayed overnight in the, get this, Maternity postpartum ward. How neat is that. Not everyone gets that privilege. Except maybe evey woman who has ever given birth.
Today I don't feel too bad. I feel better after every "nap",4 hours or more. I am going to try and cut down on the pain meds so that I can be able to drive myself where I want to go. The only thing that I feel is the fact that my whole body seems to be bloted or swolen a bit.

Well I will let all know how things are going so that you know how I am doing. Thanks for all your prayers, they have worked very well. Thanks to Richard and family for visiting me in the Hospital. Expecially thanks to Ben for the cute card he made me. It will be going into my keepsake file.