The Pregnancy

Dear Tyler,

You were my 3rd pregnancy and I wasn’t sure what to expect since my other two were so completely different. Was I going to be throwing up the entire nine months like I did with Bailey or was I going to have trouble with pre term labor like I did with Makenna or was this going to be another unique experience? Well you ended up being another unique experience! Full of fun and adventure (most of the time…). At age 40, I was on the older end to be doing this again, but I still felt so young. Your daddy said that I looked at least 5 years younger very soon after getting pregnant. I’m sure some of it was the pregnancy hormones and some of it was just plain being happy and excited. One thing I knew for sure, I wanted to enjoy every single second of the pregnancy.

A week and a half after finding out we were pregnant, we formally said our vows in a wedding ceremony at our house in front of friends and family. Afterward, we left for Costa Rica for a much needed honeymoon. I was 8 weeks pregnant with you and was just starting to feel very tired and had a little bit of morning sickness. It was a relaxing trip, but we did do a couple of very adventurous things while we were there. You were just a little peanut in my belly, but you had your first zip lining experience. It was thrilling to soar through the jungle high above the trees. We also did a 3 hour horseback riding excursion to the base of the Arenal Volcano. In hindsight, I probably shouldn’t have done that one…it was a very dangerous trip at times and there were a number of times when my horse took off running and I felt it was a bit jarring for a pregnant woman to be doing, but we had a good time…at least until your daddy was thrown from his horse at the end – just 50 feet from the barn. He had some cuts and bruises, but otherwise was fine. Very exciting stuff.

At 13 1/2 weeks pregnant, we had an ultrasound. Normally, technicians aren’t able to determine that early whether the baby is a boy or a girl, but our technician was very confident that you were a BOY!!! I had a feeling that you were a boy, but your daddy thought you might be a girl…even though we were all hoping for a boy. I wish I could describe the look on his face to you…he was so proud and happy. We had numerous ultrasounds throughout the pregnancy and it was always so exciting to see you growing. You were perfect in every way. We were told at one of our last ultrasounds that you already had a ton of hair…and they were right…you DID have a lot of dark hair when you were born. That explains the terrible heartburn I had in the last 4 months.

In my 24th week of the pregnancy, we discovered that I had gestational diabetes. That was pretty upsetting as I had never had that with my other pregnancies. For the first month, we tried to control the diabetes through diet but it was a struggle. Ultimately, after a few weeks of that, the doctors ended up putting me on insulin. Your daddy had to give me an insulin shot in the belly every morning and every night before bed. I had to give myself an insulin shot before each meal…that’s 5 shots a day in the belly! No fun. 🙁 We had no choice though…if we didn’t control the diabetes, it could have affected you and you could have been a very big baby!

Because of the diabetes, which got harder and harder to control the further along I got, my doctor decided to induce me at 38 weeks to avoid complications. That would put us at December 28th. When he was looking at the schedule, he saw that he was on duty the 26th and offered to do it that day so that he could deliver you rather than a doctor that I hadn’t met before. So the 26th it was! We will certainly do our best throughout the years to keep your birthday separate from Christmas and make it special.

You were an extremely active baby in my belly. Your daddy and I loved to watch you kick and squirm and change positions. I wondered if you would be a very active and busy little boy once you were born as well. You also got hiccups a lot while you were in my belly.

Love, Mommy