Chapter 1. My Story
My pregnancy was a surprise to me. I didn't realize that I was pregnant until I was seven months along. I had been trying to get pregnant with my son’s father, who is now deceased.
In January 2004, I thought I was pregnant because I had not had my period. I went to my gynecologist and had a pregnancy test via urine. It turned up negative. At the time, I had been training for women's professional football. I was running 2-4 miles a day, practicing catching the football, etc... and of course eating healthy.
I was not taking any medications or drinking alcohol and was in pretty good health. A few months went by and I still hadn't had my period. I went back to the doctor and met with a nurse practitioner. I took another pregnancy test via urine... still negative.
The nurse practitioner at my gynecologist’s informed me that if I was trying to get pregnant, that maybe it was my husband's issue and that he should be tested. I informed her that I was training for football and she said that if I wanted to wait, that maybe I should go on birth control pills. I declined her offer, because birth control pills make me sick. I went home and continued training for several more months.
June 2004
I started waking up every morning sick to my stomach. My husband and I thought I had the stomach flu, although the sickness was only in the morning. It went on for about a month.
Early July, I was laying in bed one morning and I felt something in my stomach. Like a kick. I thought maybe that there was something wrong with my stomach. I had my husband take me to Urgent Care and I told them what was going on.
They took a blood test and urine test. The urine test came up negative for pregnancy, but the blood test came up positive. I was informed that I was pregnant and immediately made an appointment with my OB/GYN.
My OB/GYN confirmed my pregnancy and began scheduling appointments for me.
Most mothers-to-be have time to get a nursery ready, buy baby clothes, buy maternity clothes, etc... I had less than two months to do EVERYTHING! And in my final tri-mester to boot!
So, in between battling cravings, morning sickness, working a job, doctor's visits, swollen ankles, back pains... I had to get ready for my new arrival!
Did I forget to mention, this was my first child!
I had a sonogram done, pictures taken and was told I was having a baby boy!
Everything looked normal with the sonogram, except that my son was giving the technician the middle finger in his first picture! I knew at that moment that my new little one was going to be a handful.
The doctors weren't quite sure when my due date was. So, I was scheduled for an amniocentesis to estimate when my due date was. The amniocentesis sent me into contractions and they knew it was too early. Boy, were those contractions painful!
I was given medication to stop the contractions and kept overnight in the hospital and released the next day.
My dear sweet little guy was "sunny-side up" and turned around, so I was scheduled for a C-Section on August 10, 2004 in the morning. They had estimated a few weeks too early and my son was taken to NICU (Neonatal Intensive Care Unit) and hooked up to all sorts of machines and a life support machine was waiting nearby.
His lungs weren't fully developed yet. He stayed in the NICU for about three weeks. There were complications of him not breathing or he would stop breathing when he would be fed.
Finally I was able to bring him home and then the adventure of Nick started!
After I brought Nick home from the hospital, he started progressing as any normal child would. He began speaking with words like, "mama", "dada", "kitty" (we have two cats).
He started to first roll around and then shortly thereafter he began to crawl. He loved to eat and whenever he would hear his spoon scrape the bottom of the jar, he would get upset and cry because he knew there would be no more food until his next feeding.
Nick was showing high signs of intelligence and problem solving at a very early age. He slept in my room in his crib. Next to his crib there was a dresser, but it was way out of his reach. I placed his diapers, wipes, powder, etc... on this dresser and knew there was no way he could get to the items. Unless, of course, his arms grew about 5-6 ft long or he figured out how to move things with his mind.
The first morning I walked into the room after he had his nap, several of the items were in his crib! I took a step back and looked around. There was NO WAY he could have reached that far and got those items.
I took them out of his crib and put them back on the dresser. He wasn't too pleased about his newfound treasure being taken away. I thought maybe that I had forgotten to put them away. Yeah. That was it. Lack of sleep... rushing around… changing diapers...new mom duties... Yeah, I had forgotten to put them back on the dresser.
For his afternoon nap, I made sure I had taken everything and put them back on the dresser. I checked again.
I double checked.
I triple checked.
OK. Everything was put back.
I closed the door and let him take his afternoon nap.
Several hours later, I heard him in his crib laughing. I opened the door...
You can read the rest of this story from any of the major book sellers, or also at http://www.vincestead.com or http://www.fun2readbooks.com You can also listen to it in Audio.
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