Testing testing 123

On Monday I had to take Owen up to Primary Children's for some tests on his kidneys, not sure what the names of them are in medical terms though. The first test was to check the function of his kidneys, they shot some radioactive dye into his system and then put him in this special machine that could see the dye. He had to be in the machine for 45 minutes, and even worse had to have his arms, and legs held down with sand bags. He had to have an IV also which they had to put in 3 times, since the first two times the fluid was not running into his veins. The third time they finally got a small light and held it under his arm to make it glow so they could see his veins. They were successful in getting the IV in the right place this time. And to top things off he had to have a catheter, which was more for the second test than the first.
While the test was happening, I was able to give Owen a bottle and watch what was happening inside his body on a small screen above the machine he was in. We were only able to see his right kidney, which is ok since we knew his left kidney was bad. We just didn't know how bad. The guys doing the test said they couldn't even see a left kidney.
The second test they were able to take out his IV, and then they shot some high contrast dye through the catheter into his bladder, while they watched on an x-ray machine. Owen then had to pee the dye out while they watched for back flow into his kidneys. They got the dye into his bladder and then were just waiting for him to pee, he wasn't quick enough so they started pouring warm glasses of water onto him to hopefully help him out. Five glasses of water, and a baby floating on the table were unsuccessful. The radiology tech administering the test finally called a doctor in to help her out. He tried a few things and was unsuccessful, so he suggested that they just take the catheter out and watch what was happening. This was a success and the doctor told me right then that his kidney wasn't back flowing. Yay! what a relief.
After getting home from the tests on Monday, I noticed a small "bubble" in Owens groin. I was concerned so I talked to my mom and sister about it. Come to find out that hernias are not only common on my dads side of the family, but they are also hereditary, so I made an appointment with the pediatrician for the next morning. Yep it's a hernia, and will need to be surgically fixed in about six months, unless it gets worse. I still need to call the surgeon that the pediatrician referred us to. We will meet with them to find out what they would like us to do, and probably plan surgery for a few months down the road, since they don't like to put such small babies under anesthesia.
We also met with the Urologist on Tuesday to get the test results. Owen does in fact have a Multi-cystic dysplastic kidney, that is non functioning. The urologist said that for now they won't do anything. Usually the bad kidney will shrink away, while the functioning good kidney will grow in size to about 1 1/2 times what it usually is and will take over the function of the bad non-existent kidney. He doesn't want to see us again for 6 months, when they will do a renal ultrasound to check the size of both kidneys, if the left is shrinking and right is growing like it should then they won't want to see us again for another year when they will check the size again. If everything looks good then we don't have to see them again.

All of these photos are from Owens first test, I didn't want to take any during the second test since they were doing it with an x-ray.

Before getting his catheter and IV, I thought he looked so cute in the little hospital gown

My sweet baby after getting his catheter

Using the light to show his veins for his IV

Super tired from screaming so much, and producing his first real tears

Having a bottle, you can see his little hand poking out from under under the sand bag

The monitor of the test. his right kidney is the yellow spot on the right hand of the screen. There should be two spots but his left kidney is non-functioning and this proved it

Still enjoying his bottle, and the huge machine

Different angle of the machine

Poor arm before taking off the splint, and taking out the IV

Adorable boy in his hospital gown (The tech let us bring this home as a memento)

Zade Colter Worner

Owens first cousin on the Lester side of the family was born Friday June 4, 2010, via emergency c-section. We are happy to announce that all is going well with him and his mommy and daddy, and are happy to welcome little Zade Colter to our family.

Here he is with his proud daddy.

Congratulations to Kelsey and Alan!

Owens due date

Here are a few photos that were taken on Sunday June 6, 2010, Owens actual due date. He was 3 weeks and 2 days old here. We are so in love with this adorable baby boy, and couldn't ask for anything more. All the trouble I had during my pregnancy was all worth it.

Owens first week

I feel like all we did after we brought Owen home, was run run run. Things are finally settling down and we are getting to enjoy our little miracle. I've tried to keep a list on my calendar of all the craziness that has happened starting with Owens birth. I wrote all about that in my last post, and will now post a list of all the fun things we had to do in his first week of life.

Friday May 14, 2010.

Owen is born at 5:37 am

Owen had his first ultrasound of his kidney, it really is multi cystic displastic. He'll have some more tests done in June.

Our bedroom flooded. Thankfully our neighbor was watching and was able to let my mom know, she was able to save our things. The carpet had to be ripped out though.

Owen had to have his blood sugar levels checked about 25 times, his poor heels looked like hamburger.

Lots and lots of visitors at the hospital.

Grandma Vicki bought Owen some preemie clothes, since the shirts at the hospital were falling off him. He wore this adorable blue striped shirt almost the whole time we were at the hospital.

Saturday May 15, 2010

Even more visitors at the hospital
Chase gets called into jury duty May 24th. He tried to get out of it when he was summonsed a few months ago, but even with a high risk pregnancy, and wife on bed rest he wasn't able to get out of it. He was able to get out of it now thanks to having a brand new baby with health complications.

Sunday May 16, 2010
Owen and I were both supposed to be discharged from the hospital. Owen ended up having to stay one more night and be under the Bili lights for 24 hours. He also failed his 2 car seat tests that they did this day. The test includes him sitting strapped into his car seat for 2 hours while they monitor his oxygen levels, he couldn't drop his level at all, and if he did he failed. He had to do the test because he was born 2 days too early, it's something they have to do on preemies. He failed the first one with only 10 minutes left to go, when he started to throw up and his oxygen level dropped. The second try he made it 5 minutes to the end and his oxygen level dropped, causing him to fail again. (The nurses wouldn't let us put a head support into his car seat that hadn't come with it, so his head was kind of slouched to the side for the 2 car seat tests.)
I was discharged from the hospital, but Chase and I were able to stay there one more night under what is called a hotel stay. It's kind of weird to stay in the hospital like that, we got no care and no food, but had a place to stay.
During Owens first car seat test. He looks so tiny in that huge car seat.

Hanging out under the Bili lights, Chase says they are giving him special powers.

Monday May 17, 2010
Owen got off the Bili lights.
Owen passed his 3rd and final car seat test.
Owen was discharged from the hospital.
We went home to my sister Brenas house (we are so thankful that Brena and Jered were willing to let us intrude and come to their house). We weren't able to come home to our house because we still didn't have carpet in our room, and all of our things were spread all over.
About to leave the hospital, as one very happy and lucky little family.

The adorable sign that auntie Brena made to welcome us "home". (Everyone in her neighborhood kept coming over, and asking if they had gotten a baby. When they do get a new baby we'll make sure to go all out for all the neighbors to see.)


Tuesday May, 18, 2010
Carpet was installed in our bedroom.
Owen had to go see his pediatrician, and have his Bili levels checked. He was a little high so we were told to have him lay in the sun when we could, so he could soak up the vitamin D.
We got to come home to our house, Chase spent the day getting things back in place.
Owen sunbathing

Wednesday May 19, 2010
Owen had another Bili check, his levels finally starting to go down. He still needed to lay in the sun though.


Thursday May 20, 2010
Owen has to get his Bili levels checked again. They are finally ok!
Owens umbilical cord fell off.


Friday May 21, 2010
Owen is one week old.
I had to go into my doctor to have my blood pressure checked, it was a little high, but the doctor isn't ready to treat it just yet.

Labor and delivery

Here is the story of how Owen came into the world. It was a surreal experience that I wouldn't trade for anything.

Thursday May 13th had been a pretty long day for me, I had spent the morning at the insurance agent trying to find out how to get a new windshield on our car and get all of Chases photography equipment insured before we had the baby and took some of it to the hospital.

After that at 4:20pm Chase and I had gone to the doctor for my weekly check up, he said I was dilated to a 2+ and 80% effaced. All was good and he sent us on our way. He also told us that he had already delivered 9 babies in the last 20 hours, the most he had ever done in that short amount of time in his career. We get home and I get comfy on the couch, set the TV for a few shows I like to watch on Thursdays. Chase takes his photo for the day, sits down to edit it and never gets to finish.

At about 7:30pm he was sitting down to edit, I felt something was wrong so I got up to go to the bathroom and my water broke. I told Chase I had a problem, and he just thought I had peed my pants. There was no way I had just peed my pants. I went into panic mode and the tears started to flow. I wasn't ready for this, but like it or not the baby was coming. We didn't even have our bag packed (which come to find out you don't really need anything, the hospital has it all). Chase was going to do that after he was done editing. I hurried and got on some dry clothes, and Chase got his camera bag packed. Chase and my dad gave me a blessing, and we were off to the hospital.

We arrived about 8:00pm and were immediately put in a labor room. (Man those rooms are nice!) Our nurse Jackie got me comfortable, and then did a test to make sure that it was actually my water that had broken and not me peeing my pants. She came back a few minutes later and asked if we wanted the good news or the bad. Chase asked what the bad news was and her reply was "well you aren't going home", we were actually pretty happy about that. We never did get the good news. She started an iv on my left hand to get me hydrated, but the iv kept bugging me, and my whole hand felt like it was burning. I tried to stick it out and eventually had to have our second nurse Kim move the iv to my right arm. Jackie also got me on the monitors to check my contractions, or lack thereof, and also the babies heart rate. Everything looked good.

They let me go about an hour without having very many contractions, and none of them I could feel, so about 9:00 pm they decided to start me on Pitocin to get labor going. I was doing well breathing through the contractions and holding Chases hand, until they upped the dose of Pitocin, and the contractions were getting very uncomfortable and I was miserable. During this time our nurse Kim had to change my iv to my right hand. I'm sure it was fun for her to try and do it while I was having contractions, crying and in lots of pain. She did a great job though and all the pain and burning in my left hand was finally gone.

At midnight due to all the pain I was in, I was finally ready for my epidural. The anesthesiologist came in and introduced himself, had me sign the consent saying he could treat me. Then got to work. Have you ever tried to curl your back like an angry cat when you are in so much pain and have a basketball strapped to your tummy. Yeah me either, but I was able to do it. He got the epidural in with what I though were no issues, and then said "oh we have to do it over, because I hit a blood vessel". So I had to arch away again and he finally got the second one in. The relief was instant. I believe I told him he was a god, and the best thing ever. Even when he came back a few minutes later I gave him 2 thumbs up.

The next four hours are a blur to me, mostly because Chase and I both slept through them, there was a time that I woke up, and was feeling a bit of pain, but was able to push a little button and give myself more epidural medicine.

At 4 am our new nurse Marnae came in and changed the monitors to one on the babies head and one somewhere down there to measure the contractions. Things were going well. Too bad she didn't tell us that I was ready to have the baby then. She left again and we slept again for the next hour.

5am and Marnae is back, she has me do one practice push and then stops dead in her tracks and tells me that I have to stop. Baby was ready to come. But Dr. Froerer had asked when I was admitted that if I was still pregnant at 5am if they would call and wake him up and he would come deliver me, even though he wasn't supposed to be in the office till 7:00 am that morning. He wanted to deliver the baby because he was the one that knew of all the complications I had had. I think waiting for the doctor to get there were the longest 20 minutes of my life. Marnae told me I couldn't laugh, cough, push or anything that would cause the baby to come before the doctor got there. I tried to just relax, I could feel the pressure of the baby wanting to come, and I felt like I was holding him in.

At 5:20am Dr. Froerer came wandering in, he looked pretty tired and like he'd been woken up to come do a delivery. He was in good spirits though and happy to see me so ready to have the baby. While the doctor got himself ready, Marnae told me this joke, since it was ok to laugh now. Why did the flower not ride his bike? Because he didn't have any petals! She than said it was only funny at 5:00 am, and my reply was, "or if you are 5" Next thing I knew the doctor was ready, and on the next contraction I was pushing. I pushed a total of 12 times and through 3 contractions and our miracle baby was here, and the tears started flowing. Chase and I were in awe of what had just happened. Chase was able to cut the umbilical cord, and then baby was whisked off for his stats. Owen Kristoffer Lester was born at 5:37am on May 14, 2010. Weighing in at 5 pounds 11 ounces, and was 19 inches long. He had lots of dark brown hair and his daddy's face and nose. He was perfect in every way.

After all his stats were taken and lots of photos courtesy of daddy, Owen was brought back to me for some skin to skin time, that was the best 30 minutes of my life. A few minutes later, and a few cuddles from his daddy, Owen, Chase and I were whisked upstairs to our own private room, where we were able to bond for a few minutes as a family before they had to take Owen away for a few more checks, and a bath (which evidently Chase told them we wanted to have done in our room, so that happened a bit later.) Everything checked out great, and our lives will never be the same again. I thank my heavenly father every day for the blessing that Owen is in our lives and has been for the past 9 months. He is worth all the trouble we went through to get him here.

The name game

Thanks to everyone who participated in our little poll to choose the best name for baby. I pretty much knew what his name would be when I put the poll up, but it's always nice to know other peoples opinions. Maxabillion was a joke name that Chase always used to say he wanted to name him, because million just isn't good enough.

Wiggle belly

Owen was a pretty wiggly baby in my belly. I tried to capture a better video of this, but I think he always knew when I had the camera on

He also had one foot that was always poking out,I would tickle it and he would pull it back in, and then poke it out again. Here he is showing off his mad skills of one foot up, one foot hold the binki.

Our new addition

Owen Kristoffer decided today was the day to join our family. He was born this morning at 5:37 am, weighing 5 pounds 11 ounces, and 19 inches long. He has a ton of hair and looks almost just like his daddy. We are so in love, and can't wait for everyone to meet him.

Another update

Sorry this post is quite jumbled, It has been 2 weeks since I updated on the baby.

So since my last post about non-stress testing. We've had a bunch more appointments. Usually seeing 2 different doctors every week. It's a lot of time spent at appointments, but it's what we have to do for baby boy.

My last 2 non-stress tests have gone well. The one last week, just lasted a bit longer than we had hoped for. The nurse was kind of stupid though. I have a non-stress test scheduled for every Friday until baby is here, so as of now 5 more.

As of last Friday when we had our ultrasound baby boy is measuring about 4 pounds 4 ounces, so he's a bit on the small side, but we are ok with that. My fluid level is also up to around 18cm. The specialist that went over our ultrasound with us, seemed a bit cocky and like he knew it all. He even bet us a dollar that he was right. He seems to think that the babies kidney isn't Multicystic displastic, but non-existent, or shrunken.

I met with a pediatric urologist last week to discuss a plan for babies kidney after he is born. We are to have an ultrasound on his left kidney within his first two weeks of life. And then have what is known as a function test, and also a dye test that checks for back flow into his kidneys within the first month. Then we will meet withe the urologist again to discuss all the tests.

My regular OB is happy with my progress, and excited to still see me pregnant. We met with him yesterday and he said he'd be fine if baby came any time now, even though he'd like at least 2 more weeks. I'm dilated to a 2 and 70% effaced.

In other news I made it to 35 weeks, yahoo! Chase finally finished his associates degree, it's been a long process. His plan now is to get another associates in Visual Arts with a photography emphasis. We already have him registered for classes in the Fall and he's quite excited to start them. Since school has been out, we've had more time to go through things in the basement, and get things ready for Chase to have a studio here at home, and the baby to have a bedroom.
Somewhere in there we also celebrated my 27th birthday, we went and got pizza, and then came home so I could go back to bed.
Hopefully soon I'll feel like I have something important to write about. Hope everyone is enjoying their spring.

The next big thing

I don't know how many readers know that Chase has decided to become a professional photographer, and with that decision, we are proud to announce that his new photography website is finally up and running. It's been a long time coming. We would love for you to check it out (the link is below), and feel free to give critiques or raves. Or if you need photos taken, please don't hesitate to have Chase do them.

Chase Lester Photography