Daddy's at work, Day 2

Karl went back to work OFFICIALLY yesterday. . . I know I had kept saying he was going back the following day but the first time he ended up getting a call saying they were having a 4 day weekend so he got an extra 4 days off and then Russ ended up super sick and in the hospital for over 3 hours the next time he was suppose to go back to work. So yesterday, he finally did. Being home with both of the kiddos wasn't too terribly hard. Russ is still a little sick so he was cranky and cried most of the morning. But, we got through it and I even was able to get in a 2 hour nap! By the end of the day, I still had all my hair and surprisingly still had a ton of patience left over from the day.

Today is just the same. Russ is still sick, cranky and wants nothing to do with me when I hold Addie. Makes it hard to get anything done. I get up, he cries. I touch Addie, he cries. Someone comes to the door, he cries. . . Cry cry cry. I finally got him down for a nap and Addie is down as well and so this means I should be napping butttttt, I just can't seem to get myself down. I know I should because I have been behind on sleep since Russ was born but, I'm just not that tired. I often feel like sleeping during the day is such a waste but I'm so tired most days that I don't care.

Sooo, I won't be sleeping.
Anywho, I finally enrolled in school. I am going for my associates for cvt and will head towards my bachelors in animal science. I'm tired of just having experience. I was education. Besides, this'll be super easy considering I have 7 years of experience in the animal field. I'll pass with flying colors and hopefully learn tons of new things along the way!

Nothing else is really new. We just take things day by day and roll with the punches. Life hasn't been too hectic so I'd say we are doin alright! 

6 months later . . .

I have not written in over 6 months! My last post was March 19th. My baby boy had just turned 1 a few days prior! Wow, how time flies! He's now approaching 18 months AND Addisyn Rose is here!!! 

So, here is what's been going on since my last post (: 

Meet Addisyn Rose Kroner
August 9, 2012

10:38am

7lbs 5oz

21in

Isn't she just a doll? I agree, I'm so in love. Gosh, Karl and I make beautiful kids. . . Is that vein? Lol. Anyways, this is our biggest news in the last 6 months. But of course it is! She had a little bit of a rough start but here is the story. 

So at about 32 weeks my pelvis became misaligned apparently. It started out slow but then suddenly hit hard. I couldn't lay flat in bed, I couldn't roll over, bend, sit down or get up without feeling an intense amount of pain. I was ready for Addie to arrive before she was even safely allowed to come. I was miserable. So once I hit full term, I started walking ALOT, hiking, doing things that might help ease up the labor and start labor. By 39 weeks, she still hadn't arrived and I finally gave up, telling myself she will arrive when she wants too.  On Wednesday, August 8th (2 days before my due date), I went for a mile "fast waddle". I got some contractions going but nothing that stuck around. When I got home, I bounced on the yoga ball for a little while and still no contractions so, I kicked my feet up and relaxed! We went to bed that night and at about 4:30am I woke up with the urge that I had just peed the bed. So I went to the restroom, it felt normal to me and went back to bed. As I was laying there I felt very very faint period cramps but thought nothing of it (purposely) because I didn't want to get my hopes up. 15 minutes later, I again had the urge to pee so I stood up out of bed and out came gushing fluids. . . Don't let those fuckers at the doctors office tell you that shit doesn't gush because it does (well it did for me). . . So as I'm walking to the bathroom, I yell at Karl to wake up because it's time. He jumps out of bed but SLOWLY gets ready. We seriously didn't get to the hospital (which is 5 minutes away) until after 6. My contractions weren't bad so I didn't really rush him anyways.

We arrived at the hospital and were admitted at 7am. My contractions started picking up about 8 and by 9 they were unbearable so I begged for an epidural. The anesthesiologist came in, prepped me and placed the epidural. . . This should be the good part of my labor experience right? You know, the part where the pain goes away?

WRONG!!!!!!

My arms went numb. . . Not my legs. . . MY ARMS!!! WTF?! So by the time they realized that it just wasn't going to take I NEEDED to push. The doctors told me, "don't push yet.". . . Uhmmm, this baby is going to come out right now whether someone is down there to catch her or not. That is how ready I was. Oh and did I mention my arms were numb?
So, since they didn't realize until about 10:10 that the epi wasn't working, it was too late to fix and guess who went all natural!? ME!
I thought I was going to die. 

I was screaming.

The nurse told me, "Suzanne, get a hold of yourself and breath. . ."

If I could have felt my arms, I would have hauled off and smacked the woman. 

Anyways, I only pushed for 15 minutes and our perfect little angel arrived.

It was a much different experience then I thought it'd be. Much worse. Definitely painful and for the brief moments that I felt pain I told myself I'd never have anymore kids. But, here I sit, 19 days later and only remember that I was in pain, not how the pain felt.

I'd do it again. . . 

She spent her first couple hours in NICU. She swallowed a great deal of meconium and it caused her some crappy spit up problems. She had her stomach pumped twice and by the second time she wasn't spitting up anymore. We were discharged the following day. That was seriously my shortest hospital visit ever. 6 hour labor and only 30 hours in the hospital total! GO US.

Grandma and Grandpa Kroner came to visit the following morning after we were discharged! They haven't seen Russ since their last visit when he turned 1. They were overjoyed and we were quite happy to see them as well! Lots of eating out {blah} and time for them to spend with their grandbabies.

Their visit quickly came to an end after a week and it was just Karl and I to get into a routine which happened pretty quickly. Russ was a little unruly at first but he has become a wonderful big brother. He loves to kiss her, hold her and love on her! He is learning to be quite gentle with her. It seriously makes our hearts melt.

As for now, Addie has had some reflux problems that have taken a toll on everyone here with multiple doctor visits and what not. She even had to have some oxygen again because she was in the 80's for oxygen level at her first appointment when we started noticing the reflux. The doctors put her on a special formula and it had seemed to help until last night, she was up all night screaming, arching her back, spitting up and even vomited again today which we hadn't seen since Thursday when we started the formula so we will be back to the doctor today.
Russ was on his way to school and we noticed that he was burning up. Took his temp and he has a 102.7 fever. We gave him some tylenol this morning but it's only taken it down to 101.8 so he will be going with us to Addie's appointment here in a bit.

As for the prior months to Addie's big arrival, we have done well. We have all adjusted wonderfully to Colorado and are loving it. I've made some fantastic friends here and Karl the same. We got a new dog, Kai. She is about 4 and was not wanted by her previous owners for whatever reason so we took her in and she has become such a perfect addition to the family. 

Dutch broke his shoulder and had 3 surgeries and we spent 3 months, once a week, in the ER getting x-rays to make sure the bone was healing properly. Once he did, he ended up with parvo. . . He was so young when he broke his shoulder that we couldn't finish his vaccines and don't ask me how because he never left the house due to him having the broken shoulder but somehow ended up with Parvo. Powers Pet Emergency were wonderful to us. After $3500 for his surgeries, (they let us make payments), I didn't dare take Dutch to them for the parvo because I didn't want them to think I was expecting that to be put into payments as well. So I took him to a small clinic here near Fort Carson and they were terrible. Basically told me I was killing my dog by not giving him in hospital treatment which was going to cost me $700 just to get him admitted, not counting all the days he'd need to be hospitalized and the medications.
Well, they knew we were being seen at the ER so once we left, they called the ER but didn't tell them why we were there so the ER called me, I explained the situation and they told me to bring Dutch in. They didn't care what they would have to do, they would help Dutch. His bill would have been another 3-4 grand on top of the $3500 we had already incurred but they took from their donation fund they run and gave us all the discounts they could and knocked our bill to $1500 for 5 days of hospitalized treatment and you can bet your sweet ass that they healed Dutch completely. We did send Dutch to live with grandma and grandpa Kroner though. They've been talking about wanting a dog for awhile and when Addie got close to arriving Dutch started acting out again. He started peeing in the house and chewing everything up which he hadn't done for months so we thought it best to let him go live with them and he's adjusted better then ever to life in the boonies :p

Everything else has been pretty much the same. Photography has picked up dramatically and Karl is doing well with his new unit. Life is movin right along for us Kroners despite the few speed bumps we've hit along the way. We are more blessed then we could ever imagine and that takes the place of all the monies and riches anyone could ever have in the world (:

Until next time!!!