Hullo, world!

 

It’s been a whirlwind seven days for us. Re-learning all about looking after a newborn has been a huge learning curve for us, and we also have 2 pairs of eager eyes watching us – the boys are still really fascinated with their little sister.

Both Chloe and I have had a shaky start the first few days, between recovering and health scares. But we’re getting into the swing of things, and it’s infinitely helpful having Chris around to help out with Hunter and Carter as well. Because, man, life with 3 kids is certainly a whooooole different ball park!

 

Hunter and Carter meeting Chloe for the first time. I have no memory of this, sadly! I was simply too drugged out, because of child birth complications.

For that reason, I’m also not writing the detailed birth story.. I don’t actually remember it! In short,

Went to hospital just after midnight on 29 June, with strong contractions 3-5 mins apart. 4cm dilated.

8 hours (!!!!!) later, zero progress and I was exhausted. Hello emergency caesarean, we meet again. Huge flurry of activity to prep me for surgery.

I was upset and terrified, and shaking from head to toe. Then the anesthesiologist expressed concern that the epidural was NOT working on me, and they might have to go with GA. Everything hurt, I could feel it all! They turned it up full volume and 20 mins later, it finally set in.

At that moment, my body reacted to the drugs and all sorts of bad things happened. A cocktail of more drugs was pumped into me, etc, etc. I was convulsing and shouting, conscious but unconscious….. caught in an AWFUL dream (or rather, nightmare) sequence that I really cannot repeat or write or talk about.

Between the huge loss of blood and my adverse reaction to the drugs, I was totally out of it for around 48 hours afterwards, and lost memory of seeing Chloe for the first time, breast feeding her, remembering who visited and what I said, etc.

So frightening, but I’m grateful and feel super blessed that Chloe and I came out of it alive.

Her birth cost us 19K (whaaaaat!), which was another nasty shock. But she’s thriving, and I’d pay anything for that.

 

Four days later, we were home. We had to get a cot swiftly delivered, and my parents rushed out to buy (tiny) clothes, towels, wash cloths, diapers, etc…. as we were so unprepared for an early term birth!

Seeing her lying in her cot, at home, for the first time though? Priceless.

 

I reckon Chloe looks squarely between Hunter and Carter when they were babies. Same eyes and slightly-wavy hair as Hunter, but Carter’s hair colour (though a shade lighter).

She was born 3.1KG but dropped to 2.8KG and is picking the weight back up. She’s so wee and tiny and I love it! I was praying for a petite lil girl to hold (my boys were much bigger).. so it feels really novel to hold such a small baby.

 

We bathe her in our sink, on recommendation of a girl friend, and it’s working out really well.

 

The boys basically treat her like a little doll, and are really excited because it’s all so novel. Let’s see how they feel a few months down the road when she’s much more active and noisy 😉

 

I swear boobs have muscle memory. My milk came in after the 1st feed, and not several days after birth. This meant I was left incredibly engorged as I was in full production mode, but had a tiny baby that only took 10-30ml at each feed. I was producing around 10x that amount!! Oh the pain..

It’s settling down a bit now, now that she’s bigger and can take in more at each feed.

 

For a kid with zero interest in dolls and other babies, I was surprised Carter keeps wanting to hold Chloe and will gaze at her for ages, just cuddling and murmuring little nothings to her. This lil guy is gonna make a great father one day 🙂

 

My little chickadee.. how precious and loved you are! Here’s to us surviving our first week together!