welcome to the world briggs - part I

I know,  I know I haven't written in forever but I need to document briggs' birth story and this way my sister can read it. I know my masses of fans have just been devastated not to hear from me on the regular but alas, life gets in the way. and by life I mean my laptop bit the dust and so if I want to blog, I have to do it on my desktop and that desktop isn't conveniently located on my lap in front of the boob tube.

anyways I'll start from the beginning. we also knew we wanted four kids but needed a longer break after porter and griffin [they were too close for comfort i.e. 18 months]. I can't remember exactly when I went off birth control but it was a leap of faith because I also had to stop taking a specific anti-depressant [one that had been working so well for me] and go back to one that had some side-effects I didn't love. it took over 12 months to get pregnant so at that point I saw my OB-GYN who diagnosed me with PCOS. Not that big of a deal but it would mean I'd have to take some fertility drugs to get pregnant and then be on birth control *FOR THE REST OF MY LIFE!! not great news. we thought and prayed over the matter and I just couldn't handle fertility drugs and all of their side effects so I distinctly got the prompting that we were done having kids. I felt at peace with the decision. my mom and Justin were sad but I felt good- 3 boys were perfect. I think maybe two days later I found out I was pregnant.

I had bought a spoon that says "SURPRISE! WE'RE PREGNANT" when I was still in the hospital after having griffin [again, I knew I would have another kid and it was on sale]. I am the worst secret keeper in the world so it was hard not to show it to Justin for 3 years but I finally had the chance to surprise him. I tried feeding a dinner that night that required a spoon- didn't work. so I gave him a dessert that needed a spoon- he declined. so I started eating it in front of him and then offered him a bite with the spoon and that's when he saw the message. now, I have this recorded on video but I promised him I'd never let it see the light of day. he immediately got up and called me a liar. he insisted that I had my friend Meghan pee on it [she had just gotten pregnant a few months earlier]. he just would not believe me. he left the house, went and bought a new test, and had me pee on the stick in front of him. even though, he thought I had somehow rigged it. it was hilarious.

we didn't tell the kids or family/friends for a while. I am always terrified of miscarrying [even though I've been incredibly blessed not to ever had a miscarriage] and didn't want to jinx it. I can't remember how we told the kids... maybe it'll come to me. I told my family when I was up in Utah in July. we were eating chili and I slipped my dad the spoon. he looked at it several times during the meal, looked at me, and didn't say anything. it was killing me. eventually his looks started getting more intense and he showed my mom the spoon. well, she's blind so it took a while for it to sink in but it did. that was fun, especially considering I had just told her not too long ago that I was done trying and we had decided not to do fertility treatments.

my pregnancy was similar to my others. miserable and long, but I tried to enjoy it as much as I could. when you know it's your last of something, you try to savor the moments instead of just complaining. plus we had a busy summer of traveling and swimming. I didn't tell my best friends until I was in my second trimester and we announced it online once we knew the sex. of course we wanted a girl but honestly, after trying four times, it just wasn't in the cards. I was really sick the first few weeks and slept a lot. well, I slept a lot the whole time. my whole appetite changed and I hardly ate any meat or meals. even slurpees were gross to me [can you imagine the horror?!]. I still continued to work out pretty regularly which was needed for my sanity and to keep my depression at bay [remember I had to be on the drugs I didn't like? I couldn't wait to give birth so I could go back]. I hadn't planned on giving birth during a school year but thankfully my wonderful friend heather had offered to sub for me and she is a phenomenal teacher, so that was one less thing to worry about. third trimester was beyond miserable. I couldn't walk a few feet without being in intense back pain. sleeping was even miserable. my snoring hit an all-time terrible. let's just say we were all ready for me to not be pregnant anymore.

because of Justin's new job and insurance, we had to have a new dr. deliver briggs and I had to deliver at a different hospital. my OB was one of my soccer kid's parents I had known for a while and she was so accommodating with my needs/wants. specifically having my baby on a 16th, which happened to be a three day weekend. everyone just assumes that since this is my fourth c-section, I would be okay with the surgery but I always get so terrified. it is very painful and scary. I get horrible anxiety the weeks leading up to the surgery and just bawl the whole time. during griffin's birth, the anesthesiologist wanted to sedate me because I was having such a hard time. sometime during briggs' pregnancy I had heard that people sometimes were able to have a second person in the surgery room during their c-sections. once I heard about this I just knew I had to fight to have it happen. my dr was totally ok with it but she said it was ultimately up to the anesthesiologist and that couldn't be decided until the day of.

**to be continued**