Alexander Isaac Sunderland

Let me first say that I was pleasently surprised by how great Xanders birth was!!!! It was a whole different and much better experience than Michael's.

On Tuesday morning Nathan and I woke up and got to the hospital at about 6:00 in the morning. Of course, the night before I got hardly any sleep! It was sooo frustrating. My mind was racing the whole night, and I constantly had Michael Jackson songs in my head (we had seen the new movie "This Is It" about Jackson's concert the night before). Of course, I finally fell asleep about an hour and a half before we had to leave.

So we got to the hospital about 6:00 and were shown to our room. I got into the gown (those things are always so confusing to get into! I hate them) and then they came in to give me the I.V. I hate I.V.'s!! And, I learned that morning, that I also hate BYU-Idaho interns!!! My nurse walked in and following her were 2 BYUI interns. The nurse said they were there to do the I.V. and asked if minded if one of the interns tried to do the IV.
My first thought was HECK NO!!, but the interns were right there and I'm too nice, so I said sure, why not. So one of the interns gave it a try and of course failed. Now, when I say of course, I'm not dissing the intern. It took 2 other trained nurses and 4 tries later to find a vain that would accept an i.v. But the annoying thing about one of the interns was the eagerness she had to "help".
She wasn't the one who trying the IV - just giving moral support. Everytime the intern poked me the "moral support" intern would loudly exclaim "Good try, good try!" and "You were so close!" I wanted to yell at her and say that I wasn't a soccer game! A good try would have been successful! Then the nurse mentioned the catheter (which I got after the spinal--best decision EVER!!!) and the over eager "moral support intern" started practically jumping on her feup and down exclaiming that she would love to give me a catheter!
Of course she didn't direct her eagerness at me - the "victim"... rather the intern pleaded with the nurse like I was a medical dummy to be poked and proded.
I felt very.....invisible. Everyone kind of ignored her and we told the nurse a few minutes later after the interns had left that we didn't want the intern doing the catheter. A few minutes later when the interns were back in the eager intern brought it up again. It was just so annoying how she didn't even seem to acknowledge that I was there and that maybe, just maybe, I wouldn't want her to do a procedure on me.
She also kept continually telling the nurse her schedule. "I need to check the patient's (me) vitals now because I half to go soon... or "I have to check the baby vitals right now because my paper says so..." or "You checked the vitals without me??!!
It bugged me. I wouldn't have been annoyed if she had asked me if she could do it, or asked the nurses outside of the room or something, but nope. Her grades and her education goals of utmost importance to the detriment of her medical patients. BYU-Idaho should consider a Bedside Manner 101 Class.

About 7:30 they had me in the bed and were wheeling me down the hallways to the operating room. They had me scoot over to the skinny little table (being full term pregnant and HUGE, that must have looked pretty funny!) and then they got the spinal in. The actual spinal wasn't as bad as I thought it would be. The numbing stuff before the actual spinal hurt a bit, but it was more of a pinching feeling than pain.
They had me lay down and they got everything ready. I was so worried that I was going to feel everything or that it wouldn't work, but it worked really well. I didn't even know when they had started cutting - which was kind of freaky. I hated not being able to move my back around or even move my toes. I was telling my brain to move them, but they would NOT move. I know that's a good thing, but still, it was kinda freaky.

Finally at 7:57 Xander was born! It seemed to take forever for them to cut to him and take him out but it was a really exciting wait. Nathan was right next to me standing up and watching what they were doing. He also had the camera so he was taking pictures and I kept asking if they had Xander yet. It was just fun to know that he would be born any second. Finally I heard Xander's scream and it was the best sound in the world! And boy could he scream!!!! He could also really move! I didn't get to see Xander until about 10 or 15 minutes after he was born because he was kicking and screaming and moving his arms so much that the doctor was really afraid he would drop him if he didn't hand off the baby right away. So they took Xander away and got him wiped off and warmed and did all the newborn tests on him and everything. His weight was 7 pounds, 14 ounces (so much for the big baby concern!). He was 19 1/2 inches long and his apgars were 8 and 9. It took about 15 to 20 minutes for the doctors to finish everything up and for me to get back to my room for recovery.

Finally about 30 minutes after I was in recovery Nathan and Xander and a nurse came into the room. The nurse got Xander to latch on and I fed him for the first time. All this part is a bit of a blur. I know I fed him, but I don't remember how long for and if I did the other side, too. We spent most of the day in that room and then moved to the other room at around 2:30 or so. At around 12:00 Nathan left to go see Michael and switch cars with my mom. Due to the H1N1 flu, the hospital has a policy that children under the age of 18 are not allowed in the hospital! So Michael was not able to visit at the hospital, so my mom and Nathan took turns taking care of Michael. Before we switched rooms I had a little throwing up episode and that was horrible! Of all things for a hospital room to not have, they didn't have bedpan handy. - so it got all over me. It was the worst thing ever! I was so mad they didn't have anything! And then, to make it worse, that stupid intern was so concerned about getting her stuff taken care of in time for her to leave for class, that she didn't even help the nurse clean me up! She was just standing around asking questions and being a distraction. Finally the nurse had to tell her to stop talking and just wait. It was very frustrating! So anyway, the intern finally left at 3:00 and the stay was more enjoyable.

The next few days at the hospital were really nice. The whole experience with Xander was so much more enjoyable. One of the medicines that was given to me through my spinal was a pain reliever that worked for 24 hours after the surgery! I LOVED it!!! Because of that, I didn't have any pain until the next day. I didn't even feel any of the afterbirth contractions! Xander is also a pretty good nurser! We've had more trouble latly, but in the first 24 hours of his life, he pooped 14 times!!!!! We were shocked!!! By day 2, his poop had transitioned most of the way between meconium and the newborn poop. Also, Xander was such a good sucker that my milk also came in by the end of day 2. For those who aren't aware, both of these things are not normal! For pooping, it's expected that a baby poop and pee one time for every day old they are. And as far as milk coming in, it usually comes in between days 2-4, and it takes longer if a C-section is done.
Xander and I are doing very well. We were able to come home on Thursday afternoon, and we're gradually figuring things out. We have run into some trouble with nursing, though. Apparently things were going too well. We realised the day we left the hospital that Xander had lost a full pound in the 2 days since he was born. We thought it was from all the poop, but weren't sure. After we came home from the hospital Xander stopped peeing and pooping as often and wouldn't nurse for the right amount of time. I could literally tell the time by how long he would nurse! When he finally got a latch, he would suck well for exactly 5 minutes. Then he would close his eyes and go back and forth between sucks that were getting him food and sucks that were just comforting to him. He would do that for exactly 5 minutes, and would jump if tickled or if his feet were rubbed. Then he would fall into a deep sleep and nothing that we did would get him to wake up. We could literally get his whole body wet and he would not make a noise or move a limb!
I knew this was not normal, so on Friday morning we went to a wonderful lactation consultant. She was such a great help! She had us nurse in front of her and gave us some information on what was going on. Basically, his suck had become lazy and he was having trouble getting enough milk from each feeding to give him the energy that was necessary to continue eating with before falling asleep. So we have had to supplement his feedings with pumped breast milk and give that to him through a surrenge after each feeding. I basically feel like a cow that is being pumped, but it seems to be working. Xander is pooping and peeing again, and I can see his face becoming fuller again. We were also worried about jaundice, as his skin was starting to become more yellow, but that has started going away too.
So now we're just hoping that the supplementing will help his suck become strong again and that we won't need to pump in addition to feeding to him.

We're really loving him and it's so fun to see Michael interacting with Xander! He loves to come over to Xander and rub/pat his head and say hi. He also sighs when saying hi and comments on how cute he is. Then he refers to him as his Xander, and when I say our Xander, he just corrects me and says, no, my Xander.

Our family just seems so more complete, which sounds so cliche, but it's really true. Sometimes it's really weird to look around at our family and count four people. It's just weird, but a good weird.