How We Met You

Brenli,

Today you are 2 months old, and what a wild 2 months it has been.  On April 13th I got test results back that said my bile acid levels were too high which is dangerous for you.  I had just finished grocery shopping when I got the news.  My plan was to spend the weekend meal prepping.  Those plans were put on hold because they would be inducing me at 3:30pm - just 3 hours after I got the call.  I immediately called your dad.  He was almost to work.  We were both so shocked when we realized we would be meeting you so soon!  To be honest, I was terrified.  I had a specific birth plan in place that  I wasn't sure would be able to happen.  Go figure that a birth plan wouldn't work out.

I met your dad at home.  He was packing his bag and taking care of some house things while I showered again before going to the hospital.  We sat down at around 2:45pm because we were done with everything.  I looked at your dad and said, "So...You want to just head out now?"  He quickly replied, "Yep!"  We took one last photo of the two of us with Cobie to document the last time it would be just us.

We checked into the hospital, got our room, went over our birth plan and a few other decisions before the process finally began - which was around 7pm.  They gave me misoprostol and used the folly to get things moving from 1 cm to 3 cm.  At 10:31pm, they gave me more misoprostol to get things going again.  By 1:00 AM, I was dilated 4 cm and my water broke!  I had said to our nurse, "Um...I just went to the bathroom, and I'm not entirely sure if I just peed again or..." She laughed, checked, and found that it had broken!

Things really started moving the, and it was painful!  I tried to labor in several different positions to help with the pain, but each time I did, your heart rate would drop - so they I just stay in bed to labor, which was disappointing for me, but at least I knew you'd be safe!

By 4 AM I was around 5 cm dilated and had barely any time between the intense contractions.  It felt like only seconds between contractions, and the pain was so much and I finally decided to get the epidural, which was around 5 AM.

After getting the epidural, I fell asleep almost instantly.  A few hours later, I woke up and was 9.5 cm dilated and it was almost time to start pushing!  Every contraction that hit, we would push for 3 sets of 10 seconds each.

I'll never forget the look on your dad's face when he saw the top of your head.  He looked so excited and said, "She has so much hair and it's dark!  Oh my goodness!"  The doctor echoed this and said your hair was definitely long!  Just a few more pushes, and you made your appearance after 8 hours of active labor, and 43 minutes of pushing.  I was instantly enchanted by you.  Brenli, you were stunning and just so amazing!  I knew I loved everything about you in that instant.

The next hour was a whirlwind.  I got to hold you the entire time.  We tried to feed you and you latched right away.  Dad cut your - and after that golden hour, they finally told us your birth details:  Time: 8:34am, Weight: 6 lbs 12 oz. Length: 20 in.  Your dad and I were speachless and so in love with you.  We prayed for you each day and here you were, 8 months, 3 weeks, and 2 days later.

We were moved to our room where we learned to bathe you, breastfeed, diaper, and a ton of other fun things, including swaddling, which you dad is a pro at.

We went home the next day.  It was crazy that they just let us leave the hospital with a tiny human just over 24 hours later.

And that, Brenli, is how we met you.

Today you are 2 months old.  This is the most challenging thing we've ever done, but you are so very worth it.  Your dad and I love you so much, Brenli Lynn Arruda.

<3
-Mommy-

Baby A is a...

Well, friends, we found out the gender of our little one!  Before we get into that, I want to say a huge "Thank You" to Meloney, Chris, and Emily for putting together such an incredible gender reveal party, with tons of touches of my favorite show: How I Met Your Mother.

I mean, look at some of these details!
This board was made by our Aunt Tammi, including some old wives' tales to help people guess the gender, which they did using their thumbprint on this super cute umbrella page.  Most guessed baby is going to be a boy.
















Brian and I didn't have a preference either way.  I didn't have any sort of gut feeling - but I think part of me was hoping girl just because boys are terrifying.  Haha!

We did the reveal using a colored smoke bomb under my How I Met Your Mother umbrella.  Our brother-in-law lit the smoke bomb and out came...

PINK!

Brian and I are so very excited to welcome our little girl into the world in April 2019!
Brenli Lynn Arruda, we cannot wait to meet you!

-jennilea

The Hardest Part of MY Pregnancy

Can I be real for a moment?  Well...this is my blog so I'm going to be.  Please bear with the complaining for a moment.  I promise it gets better toward the end.

The hardest part of my pregnancy thus far has been other people!  They are often so quick to jump to the most negative parts of a pregnancy and about having kids.  I hear more negatives from the world than I do positives.  It's enough to make anyone terrified.

The clichés drive me the most crazy...
I say jokingly that I was up peeing all night. They say "You think you aren't sleeping now, just wait until she is here."
I say I'm in an awkward clothing stage.  They say, "One day you'll wake up and won't be able to see your feet and your ring won't fit!"
Brian and I talk about traveling.  They say, "Better get all of that out of the way.  You won't be doing much of that for at least 18 years."
I'm working out.  They say, "Careful! Baby on board!"
I'm living life and...[insert any other another annoying cliché]"

Brian and I prayed for this.  I've read more books on conception and pregnancy than I can count.  We prepared for this as much as possible. I am a planner and I feel like this is one of the most important things we have ever planned for in our lives!

I was prepared for a lot of unsolicited advice, but what I wasn't prepared for was the amount of negativity from so many people - especially when I see this entire life stage as such an incredible blessing.

Do I think I know absolutely everything about pregnancy, babies, and birth - absolutely not.  Is it all going to be sunshine, rainbows, and positivity- Nope! But I am extremely aware of the typical things like lack of sleep and the fact that my body is changing.

I'm also so very aware of my own personal limits, like when it comes to lifting weights and running.  I've been doing insane workouts for years!  Do I plan on deadlifting 225 lbs during my pregnancy? Absolutely not! But it is so very healthy and important to me that I would stay active, which is why I'm lifting light weights and running just as much as I was before.  My doctor cleared my level of activity and is proud to see how well I've been doing, and I've been really proud of what I've been able to accomplish.

When it comes to traveling with kids, I'm a believer in the fact that you have the ability to do anything you set your mind to.  I am incredibly passionate about adventure and exploring the world.  Am I planning on taking little one out of the country tomorrow? Nope! But Brian and I want to instill a sense of adventure in our little one's life.  We want her to explore and experience other cultures and ways of living.  We want to show her places we've fallen in love with, and inspire her to dream and dare mighty things.  In that, we do plan on traveling with her, and traveling often!  In doing so, I am so very aware that it's not going to be easy, but nothing in parenting is easy.  We learn and we adjust, but we don't have to stop living out those things we are so passionate about.

Maybe you're not trying to be negative Nancy.  Maybe you're just trying to let me in on something you may have personally not been prepared for.  I see your heart in that, but maybe consider this before jumping to share the first negative thing you can think of:  The reason I need some positivity is that I'm already terrified, but for completely different reasons.

On Saturday, Brian and I FINALLY bought something for Brenli.  It's been over 5 months, yet I haven't purchased a single item for her.  I mean, girls should be fairly fun and easy to buy for, but every time I decide to take that step, fear grabs a hold of me, and I put back the cute dress I found because...what if something goes wrong?  What if something happens to her and I never get to put her in that dress?  These are the things I am scared for.  These are the things that keep me from feeling like I can breathe late at night when I worry the most.

My friend Christina shared some really good words of wisdom for me today, when I finally voiced those fears to her, "Honestly, I don't think it will go away.  I think part of being a mom is being afraid all the time.  You just have to not let the fear take away from the joy...baby deserves happiness, excitement, love, even if they're not going to be with you for long."

I can't explain in words how much I truly needed to hear that.

Most of the time, I'm excited - I mean REALLY excited about baby coming.  I'm excited for the fact that this is going to be hard and challenging because I know Brian and I are going to grow through it. I'm so excited and blessed to be able to go through these difficulties because there are others in this world who can't.

Rant over.

Ps.  Here is a picture of me at 23 weeks!  :)

-jennilea

Almost 17 Weeks!

It's been such an exciting time and I think week 16 has been my favorite so far.  I started feeling Baby A move around!  Not huge movements, but movements nonetheless.  It definitely helps things become more real for us, though I'm still waiting for the moment that this will REALLY sink in.

Last week (at exactly 16 weeks), we went to The Baby Connection for an ultrasound where they would determine the gender.  The hardest part is that we didn't get to see much of it.  Why?  It's completely our own fault.  We decided that we want to be surprised along with our extremely close family and friends when we find out the gender at our gender reveal party.  That being said, currently the only person who knows the gender of Baby A is my sister-in-law, Meloney.  Don't try to break her; she's been a great secret keeper thus far.

Luckily for us, the entire ultrasound was placed on a DVD which we are so excited to watch after our gender reveal celebration in just a few weeks. 

Here is what we did get to see though:

• Baby moves around, a lot!  All of that energy no doubt comes from me...not just because I'm physically providing all of it, but it's kind of a personality trait of mine as well. :)
• You can see baby's face on the ultrasound, and it looks like an alien.  So weird.  Haha.  The profile is super neat to see though!
• Baby prays...sort of.  They had us look at the ultrasound in this moment because we can't see the body, and because it looks like baby is praying. How cool is this!?  One of the things Brian and I (and anyone with our prayer list) have been praying for is that baby would have a passion and heart for serving God.  Seeing this makes me so excited for the hopes, dreams, and lots of prayers that we have for the future of Baby A. Feel free in joining us in prayer for baby.

Another update for the week is that I think my belly is finally starting to show a little!  I'll take a photo on Friday when I'm officially at 17 weeks, but my pants are definitely at a point where they are getting tight but at the same time maternity pants are still too big. A few people have suggested bands that help extend the pants I've got now, so I'm thinking I may go that route in the next week or so.

I'd like to end this blog with a question for Moms:  What style of maternity pants did you find more comfortable, and where did you get them from?

-jennilea

Sharing Our Story

Well, it's just about time.  Tomorrow we will be 12 weeks which means we get to share our secret with all of you.  Let me tell you, it is about dang time!  When you get exciting news, all you want to do is share it with the world.  We were blessed enough to be able to tell our closest family and friends, and through them, we are telling all of you.  If you haven't already, head over to my Facebook page to see our pregnancy reveal.

So now that you've all enjoyed that, I wanted to share with you how I told Brian:
My sister is a photographer (http://jackiraney.com/ if you're interested), and I instantly knew I wanted to tell him in a way that would also capture his reaction. We told him she was working on a couples project, which she does from time to time.  On letter boards, she had us say what we loved most about each other.  His said "I love her heart and her passion" while mine said "You're going to be the best dad! 2019"  We stood back to back and then faced each other when she told us to.  At that point, we looked at each other's signs (well, I looked at his face while he read my sign).  He had this look of confusion, and then it clicked: He is going to be a dad!  When we were talking about it later, he told me he was confused because he thought I did it wrong.  Haha!

Here are photos from that moment.  We hope you enjoy sharing in our joy:

-jennilea

11 Weeks!

Here we are: 11 weeks!  Yesterday we got to see baby.  We were expecting to hear the heartbeat, but my doctor told us they err on the side of caution during the first trimester because doppler could potentially lead to miscarriage.  So we wait until our next appointment at the end of October to hear it.

Here is a picture of baby A, who is starting to actually LOOK like a baby:

Measuring exactly to where it should be to keep that due date of April 19th.

New things for week 11:

• I'm getting my energy back! 
• I haven't really had any morning sickness.  As long as I eat breakfast, I haven't gotten too nauseous.  
• I can smell all of the smells.
• Aversions:  Minty gum (so sad), fish, fried food, eggs (except in quiche and the spinach egg wraps from Starbucks for some reason), and garlic.
• Having gained a whopping pound and a half, I'm not showing much yet.  Here is a photo from week 1 to now. 

So far we are doing pretty well. :)

-jennilea

We're Telling Family & Weekly Updates!

Ah the joys of telling family!  Now that we're feeling better about everything, we've started to tell our family and very close friends, which has been really exciting!  We've given a good amount of thought on how to tell each of those people, and we've filmed their reactions - which you will all be seeing by the time these blogs are out.  We hope you enjoyed watching it just as much as we enjoyed walking it out.

In week 7, I finally starting to feel hungry again!  I'm trying my best to eat things that are going to be good an nourishing for baby and for myself rather than using the old "eating for two" excuse.  The only hard part is that I'm getting hungry a lot more often than I did before.

Aversions: Fish, garlic, and fried food.  No thank you!

In week 8, I was completely exhausted! All I wanted to do was sleep.  

Same aversions. I'm also having trouble getting water down which is a problem I've literally never had!

In week 9, I started off sleeping my days away if possible.  I experienced a small amount of morning sickness on day.  Toward the end of the week I started getting my energy back!  I love eating cold foods, especially fruit!  Aversions are still the same.

I am doing my best to stay as active as I can even if it's just a walk around my neighborhood.  I still enjoy lifting and aerial yoga as my favorite activities!

I'm almost to week 10 and we are about 1 week out from our next ultrasound.

It's been a wild and exciting few weeks. 

-jennilea

We Saw The Heartbeat

At our ultrasound appointment we got such great news!  Baby has a heartbeat!  We got to see it and she said the rate was perfect (note to self to ask about how many beats next time).  It so crazy how baby went from being a dot at 5 weeks to seeing a head and body a week and a half later!

Somehow this is moving fast yet so slow all that the same time.

Brian is absolutely incredible and so supportive.  The hours I spent in pain in the he spent awake with me either holding me, helping put pressure where it hurt, or by pouring warm water on my tummy to help the heat kick in faster.

When I am scared, he prays with me and comforts me, not showing even an ounce of fear.  His bravery and strength astounds me - especially later on when he tells me that on the inside he was freaking out all of those scary nights.  But then we get to see this - and it's a reward for all the pain.  My body is doing exactly what it's supposed to be doing to create this home for baby for the next several months.

We are still in disbelief that all of this is real - but it's happening, and we couldn't be more excited for our future, and our family.

Our next appointment is on September 27th, which feels really far away.

Can't wait to post this journey. :)

-jennilea

Waiting Is Hard

Here I am, on August 30th, waiting...again.  By the time you reach this, we will have announced that we are pregnant (hopefully), and alllll of these posts will be available to the world, but for now, we are waiting in secret, and my heart is pounding because it's been a rough few weeks.  Here is a recap for you:

I am 6 weeks and 6 days pregnant today, but we found out around 4 weeks. Week 4 was actually pretty easy.  Nothing felt different, a few light cramps here and there, but almost right after week 5 hit, I began experiencing some really awful cramping.  I have a relatively high tolerance for pain, but these were put me in the ER, radiating to my back, and I can hardly walk cramps.  They happened often, and went from lasting about 10 minutes to over 45 minutes of the worst pain I have ever felt in my life.

When I went to the ER for the first time, I was by myself in Southern California for work.  It was 3am, and I was exhausted, and terrified.  By the time I got to the hospital, the pain had stopped.  They ran tests, did an ultrasound, and everything thankfully came back normal.  They said the cramping is normal during pregnancy and can sometimes get pretty bad but (as long as there is no bleeding) everything is fine. "It's just from growing and stretching." I was back at my hotel by 8:30am.

I had a follow up appointment with my OBGYN a few days later, and she mentioned that my symptoms are tough, because so early nearly everything is a sign for your period, miscarriage, or a normal pregnancy.  I was already aware of this though because...Google.  That being said, she wanted to run more tests before having me come in a week and a half later to see if we can get a heartbeat.  My blood tests came back showing hormone levels were still rising correctly, which gave us some peace of mind.

On Tuesday, the fear set in again though as the cramping was the worst I had felt of all the days.  Remember me mentioning cramping that radiates to my back?  The part about not being able to walk?  Bingo.  That was it.  My incredible husband took me to the ER, where we once again had tons of tests ran only to be told that it's still from growing and stretching.  Good news, but at the same time, is this life for the next 9 months?  I don't know how to experience this amount of pain while also living life and working, but I had to do something.

With much hesitation, I decided I needed to take whatever could help the pain so I could start getting rest again, and get back to work.  Tylenol is the only thing that I'm able to take, and 500mg doesn't help at all, so they recommended 1000mg, 3 times a day until it stops.  2 nights ago was the first time I've been able to sleep through the night in almost 2 weeks.  Last night was even better.

The pain is scary, and it makes me sad that I couldn't tough it out - especially because I'm really hoping for a natural birth without an epidural.  This is the first time I've felt like I can't do that;  a failure before I've even gotten to that point.

There are a lot of mixed emotions happening right now, but right now the biggest one is fear.  We are just a few hours from meeting with our doctor where I am praying there will be a heartbeat and that everything will be okay.  Pregnancy is actually pretty scary, way more than I had expected - and waiting is really hard, but that's all we can do for now.  So...we wait.

-jennilea