Sunday, October 21, 2007

Welcome to our world, Adaya Lee

Our little one has arrived. Wes posted a pic or two on his blog. I will post some when I'm feeling better and can go downstairs and work on our computer instead of Wes's work laptop.

Adaya Lee Smith was born on Tuesday, October 16, 2007 at 11:51am. She measured 20" and weighed 6lbs 11ozs. Adaya means "God's Jewel" and that's just what she is. A little jewel from God, sent from heaven, for us to love and raise in Christ. What an honor.

We arrived at OHSU at 8:15am. We were supposed to be there at 8, but traffic was bad. We figured it wouldn't matter too much since I was scheduled for 10. But after arriving we learned that we were actually scheduled for 9 and I was supposed to be there at 7. I guess there was some pretty poor communication going on there. It seems to me that it would be pretty important to let people know when their surgery is scheduled for. Lucky for us they were doing two emergency surgeries and my was pushed back.

I love IV's. Okay, not really. The nurses came in to do my IV and get fluids started. They gave me three really nice holes before they gave up and called IV therapy. I have one on the top of each wrist. But it's the one on the top of my right hand that's the winner. I had a huge knot on the back of my hand for a couple of days. Now I basically have one, huge bruise on the back of my hand. Did I mention that I thought I might pass out while they were attempting it? Yeah, it was lovely. I don't think I'd have survived if I wasn't laying down at the time. The room spun and my eyes got blurry and there was this ringing in my ears. I could hardly breathe. So they called IV therapy and we waited, and waited, and waited. In fact the surgeons and operating room were all ready, but we were still waiting for the IV. I ended up with it in the middle of my arm. It was highly uncomfortable. Any time a nurse shot anything into it, it was extremely painful.

I think I finally went to the OR at about 11. They wouldn't let Wes be there during prep, which sucked big time. He was there for Josiah's prep. It was a lot easier to "pose" for the spinal with him as a support. In fact by the time he got there I was beginning to wonder if they forgot about him. I'd already had a close to throwing up episode. After prep, things moved right along. Adaya was born and then they closed up the uterus and took at look at everything else. That's when the "incidental finding" happened. I remember the Dr asking me if I'd had my appendix removed. I remember thinking it was odd that he would ask that. Couldn't he tell if my appendix was there or not? Really, my gut was all opened up, shouldn't he know that? So they found this thing growing on my small intestine. I can't remember what they said it was, but it was basically a stomach lining cell that wandered there and began to grow. So it was a small piece of stomach lining. So they weren't sure if they should remove this thing or not. So they had to call down a surgeon from general surgery to have a looksee. However, he was in surgery, so we waited. I fairly certain that I laid on the table with my gut open an extra hour as we waited for the surgeon, waited for a special surgical instrument after the surgeon decided to remove it, and then they removed it. What fun. I could feel the spinal wearing off and kept thinking, I really hope they hurry, I don't want to feel anything. They finally finished up, good thing spinals last over 2 hours.

Off to the recovery room. We hung out there for some time. I vaguely remember getting a couple of texts while I was there. Wes actually took a picture of me trying to respond to one of them. My last spot was my room. The spinal had actually worn off so much by then that I did most of the transferring of myself to a new bed, which was so not the case with Josiah. Shortly after arriving to my home for the next four day, God placed a rainbow across the sky out my window. A gentle reminder that he was there, loving me, caring for me.

My parents came Tuesday evening. They brought Josiah. He was too cute. He loves Adaya. I can't wait to post those pics. Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday we had a variety of visitors. It was nice to have so many friends stop by and see us.

Saturday we came home. The first challenge of arrival was climbing the stairs. It was quite the workout. I haven't been back down since.

So here we are, Sunday evening, working on recovering from major surgery. I'm doing a little, but not much around the house. Mostly just caring for Adaya which means lots of nursing and trying to get lots of rest. And who should I hear now...

No comments: