SURPRISE!!!! Baby #4 On Board!

Well, you read that right. We were hit with a MAJOR surprise, and found out that we have another little Duran on the way. Of course, it’s hard to keep it a secret here on the blog – I feel like I’m lying on my daily updates by never mentioning it! But, we’ve finally gone public, and it’s time to play some catch-up.

First, some backstory. Three kids….the plan was always three kids. After Eliza was born, our family was complete. I felt complete. Yes, it was hard to know that I would never experience pregnancy again. No more ultrasounds, no more sweet little kicks. It was hard to know that we would never again have a little, tiny newborn baby in the house, with their sweet little sounds and that heavenly baby smell. But, we were done. One of my major goals as a parent is to make sure we can always provide more for our kids than we had growing up. I want to be able to support them, I want them to experience life and (while not spoiled) never want for anything. I want them to play sports, be involved in activities. I want to help pay for their cars when they start driving, help pay for their college education, help pay for weddings (notice HELP, not do for them). Obviously, the more kids you have, the harder that is to do. So, we had to make the responsible decision, and be done.

After Eliza was born, I did not go back on birth control. As with all three kids, my period did not return until 1-2 months after I was done breastfeeding. There was just nothing to protect against, so I didn’t want to put the additional hormones into my body. I finished nursing in April 2015, and my cycle returned in June. Of course, all out of whack, so I was tracking on an app to see when/where things were settling. Meanwhile, Christian and I had a conversation, and came to an agreement that he would get a vasectomy. I had already gone through years of birth control, 3 pregnancies, 1 c-section and 2 vaginal births – I had done ENOUGH! Christian went in for a physical to start the process (Lord knows when his last one had been), and that’s when they discovered the lump in his chest. So, the vasectomy was put on hold while they biopsied, tested and removed the lump. Meanwhile, we were using alternative forms of birth control…

On November 13, 2015 – we found out that said alternative form of birth control had failed. Big Time. When I got a glaring positive pregnancy test. It was a Friday...my Friday off. It was just Eliza and I. I tested, and, at first, the test appeared to be negative. I had this huge sense of relief. A couple minutes later, I looked at it again…and it smacked me in the face…that little second line, staring right back at me. It wasn’t super dark, but it was there, no doubt about it. I had been having random boughs of nausea, which was my first big telltale with Amelia and Eliza, so something inside me just knew. I cried. And cried. And cried some more. I was so overwhelmed, and had no idea what we were going to do. How we were going to survive. I messaged my sister-friend Dawn for support. I texted Christian – who took everything much better than I did. I turned to one of my mom’s groups. I knew that I wouldn’t be going public for quite some time, and needed a support system in place.

Two days later, I tested again…skipping right ahead to the good old digital “Pregnant or Not Pregnant” test. Sure enough, almost immediately, a big old PREGNANT was staring right back at me. There was no question. This was happening. And I was in full panic mode.

I’m an OCD planner…a big picture planner. I can’t live life day by day. I’m always thinking of the what if’s. I mean, the second I found out, I’m thinking of daycare and how we can adjust our budget and how we’re going to make this work. It’s stress…sun-up, to sun-down. Those first few days….well, first couple of weeks really were just a blur of emotions and stress, and feeling completely overwhelmed. I finally called the clinic after about 10 days of letting is sink in, and scheduled my first appointment. With that, it started to really feel official. Like it or not, this was happening.

Over the next couple of weeks, similarly to my past pregnancies, the symptoms started to hit, but never anything too horrible. Nausea on and off all day, worst when driving and in the evening, lack of appetite, of course exhausted…but nothing unbearable. Around 7 weeks, everything REALLY kicked in and I was really fatigued and getting really sick…and SUPER hormonal/emotional. I think between the pregnancy itself and all of my feelings about it flying around, the emotions started taking a toll. And, as the weeks went on, I started to show. I've always "shown" pretty early, and this time was no different.

 On 12/9/15 I had my first appointment. I was filled with lots of information about what to do, what not to do, when my appointments would be, what to expect. All of the usual. My blood pressure was sky high and they were really concerned about that. And, with my weight/fairly recent weight gain, they were also a little concerned (as expected). My midwife, Ann, came in to chat and get some background and information. I kept wanting to burst into tears talking about it – I’m having such a hard time accepting everything and even talking about it. We finished chatting, we did my physical/check-up and talked about what’s in store for upcoming appointments. She wanted a first trimester ultrasound next week to date/verify the pregnancy, and then my next appointment, to check blood pressure and have a screening ultrasound the first week of January. After my appointment, I was off to the blood to donate a million vials and blood and pee in a cup. All of the fun stuff. And, finally made my way back to work.

Shortly after settling back in at work, I received a call from the doctor’s office. Ann had consulted with the OB team and they ordered some additional testing. They want me to do a glucose test to check for diabetes (not gestational, just general), because of my weight/gain, some pre-e testing, including a 24-hour collection, because of my high blood pressure, and they want me to be re-cleared by a cardiologist because of my high blood pressure (I’m guessing it’s also because of my weight).

With how sick I was suddenly feeling, with my emotions all over the place, and all of these upcoming appointments I’d be taking off work for, I knew I had to talk to my boss and get it over with. Of course she was SUPER supportive and worried about me. She made it clear that she'll do anything we can to make sure that I stay healthy and that the workplace was a safe and happy place. She talked about possibly doing some work from home and seems to be willing to be flexible there. I had a complete breakdown in her office, and even though I really hate to get emotional like that, it felt really good to just let it all out and be upset. It definitely all came flooding out though. Soon after, I told two other close friends at work. It was time I had some real live people to talk to about everything.

On 12/15/15 I had my next appointment. It was bright and early, and I stopped into the Lab first to drink the glucose drink for the 1-hour test. Icky. While that settled, I went to my ultrasound appointment. It was a quick one, just for dating/verification. She picked baby up right away, and the little heart was flickering away. I still wasn’t in a great place – still really emotional and having a hard time accepting everything. But, it was of course amazing to see. The heart rate was 174bpm, which they said was perfect for 8 weeks and measuring right where it was supposed to. What I found really interesting was that the tech was checking my ovaries and everything, making sure it was all looking good, and she said she could tell the baby “came from” the left ovary. I never knew you could tell that, cool! After the scan, I was back down to the lab to wait out the rest of my hour. While I waited, they had me pee-in-a-up for my pre-e testing, and shortly after it was time for my glucose blood draw. Then I was sent on my way with my 24-hour collection “package” and to wait for the results to come in. It was a long day waiting, but late in the afternoon the results came in. I passed my glucose test with flying colors, and there didn’t appear to be any protein in my urine analysis (with either round of testing), so things were looking good!

As the next few weeks progressed, I was definitely showing more and more, and actually getting more nauseous and sick as the weeks went on. It seems that has been worse with each pregnancy. By 11 weeks I had actually lost about 10 pounds from not being able to eat much. I guess that’s not the end of the world! We finally announced to our parents on Christmas Eve/Christmas Day. It was nerve-wracking, and while they were all pretty shocked, and not necessarily super excited at first, they were all pretty supportive and quickly started to adjust to the news. Quicker than I was, that’s for sure!

 On 1/4/16, I had my second ultrasound and another blood draw. This was for a “Nuchal Translucency Screening”, basically to check for signs of Down Syndrome or other genetic disorders. The ultrasound checked out well, and everything was measuring right on schedule. It was crazy to see how much the baby had changed in a few weeks, and see it flipping around and moving in there. Made up for the midnight meeting with the porcelain gods…a little bit. The screening results were in by the end of the week, and everything came back negative. Everything continued to progress normally.

On Friday, 1/8/16, I hit 12 weeks and finally decided to bite the bullet, and go public with the pregnancy. It’s taken a long time to terms with everything that is going on…to accept that we don’t always have control over our life plans. I still often can’t believe that this is all actually happening. So, because I’m having a hard time myself, it’s been hard to open up to other people about it. On top of that, I wasn’t sure what kind of reaction we would get from people. Would they be rude? Would they be excited? Would they thing we were crazy (and point that out)? And, of course, I knew the boy comments would be the biggest thing. It’s important to me that people don’t think we’re just “trying to get that boy”…because, 1) we aren’t trying at all, and 2) I’m perfectly content with my family of girls, and I don’t want that belittled. I posted our announcement photo on facebook, and I was pleasantly surprised by the pretty positive response we received. We got a few funny comments, a lot of people were shocked and surprised, but overall just a lot of “congrats” and some excited friends. It actually felt relieving to get the news out there…to not hold it in anymore and just be able to relax. And, actually getting the support from our friends and family will probably help quite a bit.

Following that, we finally told the girls about the big news. We took a video and got some pretty priceless reactions from them. We didn’t want to tell them sooner, because I knew they wouldn’t be able to keep the secret, so it was nice to finally tell them. Olivia seems really excited, and she’s been asking every day since if the “new baby” is coming yet. Amelia is pretty wishy-washy on the topic – I think overall she is not very excited about the idea of another kid in the house. Eliza obviously doesn’t get it yet…but, I think she’s in for quite a rude awakening. She’s still so clingy, and requires constant attention…I don’t know what she’s going to do with a baby in the house, battling for that. Should be interesting!

Here is the video from telling the girls.

So, now that the news is out there, that ends my novel of a pregnancy announcement. It’s been a long road of acceptance so far, but overall I feel like time is FLYING by, and this baby is going to be here before we know it. Life is going to change big time, I think more than we can even fathom, but with each passing day, I feel like we’re more and more ready to take the challenge on.