Aubrey Jane's Birth Story

As I want to make this into a book for our family, I figure the birth of our beautiful daughter should be included.  Will was a difficult baby, and by difficult I mean he cried ALL the TIME, so Justin and I's theory was to get the baby having over with as fast as possible. I mean why put off more misery of the first year??? Oh, how naive we were. Ha. It sounded like a good idea at the time:). 

So, when Will was 13 months old, we found out we were pregnant!!! We were beyond excited when we found out we were having a baby girl--over the moon! Boys are very dominant in Justin's family, so we just assumed we were going to have all boys.  I can still remember the surprise and excitement we both felt when the ultrasound technician told us we were having a girl; it is truly a moment I will never forget.  I have always wanted to have a boy first and then a girl. My mom's name was Jane, so I had wanted that to be Aubrey's middle name. Aubrey doesn't have any significance besides I just loved the name, so that is how we came up with our sweet Aubrey Jane's name. 

As if chasing an 18 month old around wasn't enough for this pregnant momma, we moved from Memphis to Charlotte, NC when I was 29 weeks pregnant.  Wow.  What a whirlwind that was.  I would not recommend it, but God was faithful and totally took care of all the details.  I had preeclampsia with Will at 35 weeks, so I was very quick to find a new doctor.  My pregnancy overall was great! I had a little preeclampsia scare at 34 weeks, but after some testing, everything checked out perfectly. I had a C-section with Will man, so we decided it would be best to schedule another c section at 39 weeks.  It was so wonderful to have that time to get Aubrey Jane's room ready, pack the night before we left, clean the house and just to feel prepared for our sweet girl.

The night before we went in to have AJ

That morning went perfectly! I had actually started having contractions the night before we went in to have the C-section, so I was glad to at least know what they felt like, as I didn't have any with Will. I think I had just enough to know I didn't like them:).  The nurse told me that morning I would probably have been in that afternoon ready to have our baby girl.  My C-section went right on schedule and our beautiful baby girl arrived crying her little head off. Side note, I was the doctor's FIRST solo csection, as she had just gotten out of residency not too long before I came along.  I guess that is what you get when you move to a new place in your 3rd trimester.  After they finished sewing me up and checking Aubrey out, we got to introduce Aubrey Jane to her big brother and her Mimi (Justin's mom).  She nursed great immediately, and I was so relieved because that was quite the challenge we had with Will.

Right after meeting Aubrey.  Will wasn't quite sure what to think:)

UNFORTUNATELY, as the day progressed Justin and I could both tell something was wrong.  Aubrey was breathing fast and almost grunted at times.  We knew some warning signs because of Will, and we actually voiced our concerns to the nurses several times.  The pediatrician checked her out that evening and gave us the green light that she was A-Okay.  That night was terrible.  She wouldn't nurse, she cried a lot, and I was just knew things weren't right.  Around 4am they came in for their check, and Aubrey had a little fever.  About 45 minutes after taking her to check her out, the pediatrician came in to tell us her blood oxygen was too low, and she was being admitted to the NICU.  Break my heart.  I had a good cry- I mean ugly, bawl your eyes out, need a moment cry:).  Justin and I prayed, I put on my big girl pants, and decided it was time to put that trust in God into action:). But, oh boy, that nurse that came in to check on me after that doctor left probably thought she was dealing with a crazy person.  I mean, really, what are the chances of having 2 babies go to the NICU for completely different reasons??!

The Lord is always so good with timing, and allowed me to have some pretty sobering perspective as we went to visit Aubrey and saw many other babies in the NICU fighting to make it.  Our girl was full term and healthy. The Lord was beyond good to us, and I got a little slap in the face with that reality.

 Here are some pictures of our sweet one while in the NICU.

 After many tests, it turned out Aubrey was born with fluid on her lungs, which can be a side effect of having a C-section.  She just needed time and extra oxygen to help her lungs dry out so she could breath easily.  She was in the NICU 5 days total, but it was so much more laid back than Will.  She ate great, was super sweet, and maybe it was also because we just knew what to expect and were prepared.  But, I do know it was night and day from our NICU experience with Will.  The worry and fear that overwhelmed me at times when Will was in the NICU was not there with Aubrey. Thank you, Jesus, for that. Justin will still say I asked 10,000 questions whenever a nurse came near me. I know the doctors ran the other direction when they saw me standing there:).  Ultimately, we knew she was healthy; her lungs just needed time to "air out." Justin and I now joke that we produce children that can't breath well and don't like to eat, as both struggled a lot with reflux.

We were able to stay in our room at the hospital until Aubrey was discharged.  It was so nice to be able to leave the hospital with our daughter!  Unfortunately, our story of my pregnancy didn't end there, but that will be for another blog post. We are so beyond blessed by our sweet little one. We could not be more in love with our Aubrey Jane Paslay.

Here we are finally getting to take Aubrey Jane home.  Cannot believe how tiny she was!!