Home Sweet Home....

Well, we would have never thought it but we are home and this baby is still in my belly! It was one of the hardest decisions I have had to make and it took a lot of convinving from BOTH of my doctors but I decided to come home. I completely trust both of my doctors and I know that they would never recommend I do something that would put Eliza in harms way - so here we are - 400 Bayfield Drive, laying in a king size pillow top bed. Praise the LORD! I asked what I should be watching out for and they said kick counts 1 time a day and if contractions are so bad that I can't talk through them and there are more than 6 an hour. Well let me assure you if I haven't felt Eliza move and I have 1 contraction that I can't talk through - we are outta here!

We will continue to be closely monitored - we go in tomorrow for a fluid and blood flow check and we will continue to do that every 2 days and I think they are going to send me home with a doppler to monitor her heart beat - feeling her move is just as reassuring! So that is where we are ... home and happy!

I know Eric will sleep so well tonight - I will too - no 6:00AM blood sugar checks! We were so fortunate to have received the care and attention we got while in the hospital for 2 weeks. Everyone was sooooo unbelievably good to us and it was an experience we will never forget.

For your viewing pleasure and my embarrassment, you'll see a picture above of our favorite nurse and new friend Lindsay as well as 1 of the 3 cart loads of all of our stuff ... let's just say that 2 laptops, 2 cameras, Eliza's clothes, my clothes, and Eric's clothes, 1 sound machine, 1 cd player, 5 pillows, 3 plants and Lord knows what else - it all adds up! Thank goodness we left when we did otherwise we would have needed a UHaul!

Suzy should be arriving home shortly. She went to the Spa this AM in Whiteville and may or may not be happy to be home. Apparently, daily trips to different Grills around town have made her quite the hotdog expert. I wish I could attach the picture that Cynthia and Charlie took of Suzy eating her first formal meal AT THE TABLE! Does anyone else wonder if our dog is this spoiled what will happen to Eliza -

Well I guess that is it for now - your prayers are what got us home and your prayers will keep us home - can you believe we will be 35 weeks on Sunday??? Eric and I say that like 1000 times a day we just CAN'T beloieve it - I almost for the first time in 9 months feel like a normal prego ... PRAISE HIM for all his many many blessings. Oh yeah - I have asked for a lot of prayers from you guys the last 5 months and I just want you to know that Eric and I pray for all of you each night and thank God for you - our wonderful friends and family.

We love you.

Caroline, Eric and Eliza

Expecting the Unexpected....

Well what can we say … the girl has a mind of her own. Eric, me and all the doctors have decided to stop making any assumptions about Eliza because she is going to do what she wants to do when she wants to do it – guess she is getting us ready for the teenage years.

Well the latest on Eliza is that she is a “new baby”. Yesterday we had a growth scan, more Dopplers and a check on my amniotic fluid level – happy to report that my fluid is now a 10 (who would have thought) and blood flow to the baby is within normal ranges and she is an 8 out of 8 for activity. She even gave us a few winks and opened her mouth – so neat! In my non-medical opinion, although I feel like I could be an OB at this point, I think she LOVES all the fluid! She continues to be a peanut but growing nonetheless. They estimate her weight to be 3lbs & 12oz. This means she has gained 8 oz in 2 weeks … not ideal but at least she is GROWING!! All this news means we can keep her in a little longer. We will do another scan on Thursday to check fluids – if they are still up we might talk about going home for a little bit – SOMETHING NONE OF US THOUGHT POSSIBLE A WEEK AGO!

I attribute all of this positive news from your prayers – my belly has been wrapped in a prayer shawl, made by our church, for a week – we can feel God’s work everyday – thank you!

Eric and I are doing well – we are really getting excited about meeting Eliza. We have it all planned (haven’t we learned anything yet). We have asked all the questions about what to expect from a C-section, Eric knows where to sit and stand in the operating room, the camera is ready and her preemie clothes and blankets are washed and here! I smile at the thought of her making us wait 5 more weeks – who knows!?

I am getting another prenatal massage today. I so wish Eric could get one. Twelve nights on a pull out chair are starting to really hurt his back. He is so loyal and good to me – how did I get so lucky???

Oh yeah - I almost forgot to tell you about Sunday – well in addition to Eliza being 34 weeks I had a very special visitor – to my room – for 4 hours. SUZY!!!!!! IT WAS AWESOME. We snuggled in bed just like we were at home. I think Eric will attach a picture.

Well that’s all the news for now – thank you for your continued prayers and support!

We love you

Caroline, Eric and Eliza

Weekend Update

Hello everyone in blog land. I wanted to give you a quick update. Well, no baby yet. Caroline and Eliza are still doing well. We had a little more eventful day yesterday. Caroline had her morning monitoring session and she had a few contractions and the baby's heart rate was up a little. So she got an IV and everything calmed down. They were not too concerned with the elevated heart rate. Eliza's just more active.

We also had another ultrasound yesterday. Happy to report that Eliza looked good and Caroline's amniotic fluid actually was up around a 7. It was a 3 earlier in the week. Anything less than 3 and they'll go ahead and do the C-section. So 7 was awesome! She also got an 8 out of 8 on a test they do as far as movements in utero.

Tomorrow we are at 34 weeks! Yahoooooooo! That's the big milestone. Of course our favorite doctor (Dr. Lydia Wright who's the high-risk OB-GYN, Perinatologist) told us now we are going to shoot for 35 weeks. At that point we'll re-evaluate but more than likely they'll do a C-section unless her fluid is up to a 10 or so. Oh yea, I posted a picture of Caroline and Dr. Wright. Caroline had just gotten out of the shower.

We decided Eliza's baby clothes (0-3 months) would be too big since she'll be around 4 pounds. So we got online and ordered preemie clothes. We got them yesterday and they are sooooo small. A onesie literally is the size of my hand. They are really sweet.

Our next thing is another ultrasound on Monday. We will also get a growth scan on Monday to determine size. Let's hope that all of the bacon and eggs Caroline has eaten has fattened Eliza up!

Last, we cannot access our blogsite or hotmail from the hospital. So, I'll try to update as often as possible when I'm in the office. Caroline does have access to her work email: caroline.lytle@nmfn.com.

Take care to you all and thanks again for your calls, gifts, and most importantly, prayers!

-Eric for the family

Update from Room 343

First, let me say THANK YOU! Thank you for all your prayers, blog posts, emails, phone calls, flowers, magazines, food, hospital mail … and the list goes on. Eric, Eliza and I have never felt so loved - so thank you!

Since I am not able to blog in the hospital I’m going to write a post and let Eric “post” it to our blog once he gets to the office. I know there hasn’t been one in 2 days and the troops are getting restless.

Well happy to say at the moment there is not much to update. Everyday we do a stress test in the AM - I think they should call it a stress test for me and not the baby. For those of you unfamiliar with a stress test - they just put a monitor on my belly and it prints out a 30min heartbeat scan - Eliza is completely oblivious to any stress and sleeps through it most of the time which stresses me out! Oh well - the girl likes to sleep. We are pleased that she passes every time despite her lack of activity! Eric and I normally request a second one in the PM - which she seems to be more awake for. I am thinking maybe it the bacon, eggs and grits every morning that are putting her to sleep. It sure is yummy though! This morning she was actually very active and responsive – might be the sausage – good grief if Eliza doesn’t fatten up – I am!

The rest of the day I just hang out and wait for whatever might come my way. You wouldn't believe all that goes on around here. The craft cart comes by daily and then there is “mail call” which I love and thank you for all the emails. Get this – I was able to get a prenatal massage yesterday. It was WONDERFUL and all provided by the hospital. When the nurses told me about it I thought it would be just so so but happy to report it was no different then one I would get at the spa – except I didn’t have to pay for it! Too bad Eric couldn’t get one.

All of the nurses are wonderful and take such good care of all three of us - they even make Eric's bed and Miss Mary brings him a plate of food - every meal whether he is here or not. Housekeeping takes care of cleaning the bathroom daily …. Fresh towels - clean floor and lots of TP ;) One of our favorite nurses is Lindsey and although she is not always our nurse – she’ll always stop by for a visit. I think Eric will attach a picture of her. We call this place the Hanover Hilton.

The only thing missing is Suzy. I cry at the thought of not having her in bed with me to snuggle but I think I am going to have some four legged visitors later today! Now if you are wondering how Suzy is handling all this I would say just fine. She had a 4 day slumber party with her best friend Rylee and then went to Whiteville to stay with her grandparents … yesterday she had a babysitter who threw the Frisbee to her for an hour and a half! Last night when we called she had just finished her Chick Fila and was eating ice-cream in the den - can you say SPOILED!

Well I guess that is all to report for now. As each day passes I get more excited and nervous. We have tried to prepare ourselves as best we can (the NICU tour helped) and we know that without a doubt we are all three in the hands of the Lord and feel his presence everyday as we go through this wonderful experience!

Take care of yourselves and thank you again for ALL that each one of you has done for us!

We love you -
Caroline, Eric and Eliza

Update from new Room 343

Ok, we are still have internet problems at the hospital and hopefully we'll have that fixed today. We are now in a private room which is nice.

We had a pretty calm weekend just getting monitored, but yesterday Caroline had a contraction and the baby's heart rate when down, which they didn't like. So we went ahead and had an ultrasound which showed her amniotic fluid levels around a 3 (no change). The baby was moving a lot on the ultrasound which reassured the Doctor. If we have repetetive contractions with drops in heart rate, then they'll go ahead and bring Eliza out. So we'll just continue to be monitored.

Caroline is doing well and is NOT a wreck. I think she is comforted in knowing that we are now at 33 weeks which is so much better than where we were at 17 weeks. I don't think we would have thought we'd get this far. So we know that all chances are that Eliza would be fine with a short stay in the NICU if she came now.

Also, your support and prayers help Caroline and me and Eliza of course. She really does feel the concern and support that you all provide. So keep it up! Doctor's orders!

We did take a tour of the NICU last night and they tiny babies. Some were good in size but one was no more than 2 pounds and really small. It's sad to see but they really are fighters!! Miss Eliza is too!

Love and thanks to you all!
Eric

Internet problems

Ok everyone, my laptop is no longer working in the hospital. We can get on the internet, but not blog sites or hotmail. It must be our work security features or something. I ran home to pick up a few things so making a quick post to let you know what's up.

Caroline is about the same today. Stess test was good but she had a few mild contractions on there so we'll get another one around 3:00 today. I think we will take a tour of the NICU after dinner tonight.

Hopefully I can post again tomorrow. We are going to call tech support and try to get it worked out. Caroline can check her work email which is caroline.lytle@nmfn.com.

Eric

Live Update from Room 303

Internet update: Ok Folks, We are back up and running with internet and blog capability. Yahoo! I brought my laptop since Caroline's quit working. If you need to email her, use her hotmail which is lytle_caroline@hotmail.com.

Room update: We moved to room 303 which is a semi-private room but we do NOT have a roomate which is nice. Caroline and I have shared a twin bed the last 2 nights. Me, Caroline, a big belly and a body pillow all on a twin.

Baby update: No baby yet. We continue the baby stress tests (twice/day) and so far she seems to be doing fine with very little fluid to move around in. This morning we had another ultrasound to look at Caroline's amniotic fluid levels and the blood flow to the baby. As we told you on Thursday, she was a 3. Today she was a 3 again and the blood flow looked good. So, no C-section this weekend which they were starting to discuss with us.

So, our new goal is 34 weeks. Eliza will be 33 weeks tomorrow. We'll continue to do stress tests everyday and ultrasounds every 2-3 days to measure fluids. The FFN test was negative this week so she wants to stay in there for 2 more weeks. A NICU doctor came down today to tell us what to expect when she comes. He said that if she comes at 34 weeks, then she'll probably be in there 2-4 weeks. Regardless, if Caroline somehow makes 35 weeks they will automatically do a C-section. So we will for sure have a baby within 2 weeks. We will be in the hospital until Eliza comes.

Caroline is doing well and she even got her nails painted pink tonight. Our room phone doesn't work for some reason so cell phones will be the best way to call. And hopefully we can keep blogging!!

Thanks for all of your prayers for the baby, Caroline and me too! We are really blessed b/c we have 2 great Doctors and the L&D (that's Labor & delivery) nurses are awesome!

Tomorrow, we have a tour of the NICU to look forward to. So, goodnight to all and hopefully we can post tomorrow.

-Eric for Caroline