Rebekah Updates

After a day (and night!) of contractions, Rebekah decided to arrive at 1:40 this afternoon with only a few pushes. Congratulations to Rebecca Wood (a good friend from college) for coming the closest with her guess of 6 pounds even and 18 inches long. Rebekah was in fact 5 pounds and 15 ounces and 18 inches long.

Rebekah has taken to sucking on a pacifier, which is very good for learning her suck and swallow reflex. Right now she is not being allowed any foods until the doctors decide when they will be performing her surgery. Rebekah has an IV that she is receiving nutrition through for now.

All of the ultrasound technicians commented that Rebekah had lots of hair, and she does! Her hair is light to medium brown and for now is quite wavy. I'm hoping she keeps the wavy curls! :) Like all of her brothers, she also has blue eyes.

Rebekah has a couple of buddies sharing her crib with her. Drew and I used some gift money that was given to Rebekah to purchase the little pink and white puppy dog. She doesn't have a name yet - any suggestions? Rebekah also has a little pink teddy bear from Grampy and Grammy in her crib.

Now for the medical updates: We met with Dr. Walsh (a cardiology fellow) tonight and learned about some of the tests that have been run on Rebekah so far. Pretty much everything that the doctors have seen has confirmed their original diagnosis. Rebekah does have Truncus Arteriosus and will definitely require surgery to correct it. We also knew that there was a question about the pulmonary artery leading to her right lung. From the tests that the doctors were able to do today, we still do not have a clear picture of how blood is being supplied to that lung. There has been some discussion of doing a CT scan tomorrow to see if that will shed some more light on how the blood flows to her lung. For now, the doctors are assuming that the blood is flowing through a normal hole in her heart called a ductus. This ductus closes within hours after birth, so she is on a medication to prevent the closing of the ductus just in case it is supplying her lung with blood.

One of the side effects of this particular kind of medication is that it tends to make babies forget to breathe. Rebekah had three apnea spells this evening (two of which we were in the room watching). During the last apnea spell, the nurse had to blow air into Rebekah's face to stimulate her breathing again. Dr. Walsh recommended intubating Rebekah and giving her a little help breathing with a ventilator. We agreed that it is the best option at this point as long as she has to remain on the medication.

Tomorrow we will be meeting with two of Rebekah's main cardiologists and discussing the possibility of the CT scan and the results if they decide to go ahead with it. Based on the results of the CT, the doctors will decide the best option for surgery.

We are heading back to the PCICU to see Rebekah before going to bed. We will update again tomorrow after meeting with the doctors and hopefully having a better idea of where we are headed in the next few days.

Nancy

She has arrived!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Rebekah Grace Ellis has arrived. She is 5lbs. 15oz and 18in. long. Mom and Bekah are doing great!! So far Rebekah is breathing on her own and not showing any signs of trouble. The doctors are working on running all kinds of tests to determine the extent of her heart defect and if there are any other problems. Praise the Lord our little one has arrived. He is so gracious and we give all the praise to Him.

D

Heading to OR

We are ready and heading to the OR!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! We are delivering in OR as a precaution not having a C-Section.

Water......

They just broke Nancy's water. Still at a 4. Things should move along faster now.

D

Epidural

Nancy just got her epidural. She is doing so well on her own they are holding off on the pitocin. Next they will break her water in a bit.

D

Morning All

We had a long night. Well I snuck in some sleep, but Bekah and Mommy are tired. Nancy is doing well. She is currently at a 4 and waiting on her epidural to be put in. After this is done they will wait a little bit and then break her water. They are also going to start some pitocin shortly after the epidural is in. Shouldn't be to much longer and little one will be here.

D

Pain meds

We are progressing along. So far Nancy is dealing with the pain of contractions well. She has just gotten her first dose of IV pain killer. They are coming back in to start some insulin in a few minutes. Nancy's sugar is to high. They don't want Bekah to have a sugar crash when she comes out. Nancy is trying to get a little sleep for a bit.

Drew

Progress!!!!!!!!!!!!!

After having fairly steady contractions for the last two days, I checked in today to find that I am still at 2 cm, but I am 50% effaced!! I am excited!! Since being hooked up to the fetal heart monitor, I have been having contractions every 2 minutes. It would be so cool to have Rebekah all on my own without pitocin, but we will wait and see what happens. IF I stop progressing, the plan is to start with pitocin in the morning around 8:00 or so.

By the way, the doctors are allowing me to eat supper, so I am happy!! :)

Updates to follow as soon as something happens!

Nancy

Last Day to Guess!

Today is the last day to guess Rebekah's birth weight and height! We've been having lots of fun seeing how much each of you think Rebekah will weigh. Click here to add your guess!

As you can imagine, we are very excited to meet her. We were even wide awake this morning at 6:00 even when we had the opportunity to sleep in! We'll be hanging out at the hotel for the morning and then some sight seeing before checking in this afternoon.

Contractions have been pretty steady through the night, so maybe things will progress quickly tomorrow! :)

Excitement!

We safely arrived in Charleston around 7:00 this evening. Our hotel room is great - very relaxing!! When we first got to Charleston, there was a round of severe thunderstorms moving through, and even a tornado in the area! Thankfully, where ever the tornado was it wasn't near us!! We have had several storms roll through and saw a really fantastic lightning show.

Our plan is to rest and relax for tonight and in the morning. We were able to get a late check-out time, so we don't have to be out of our room until 1:00 tomorrow afternoon. Before we check in at MUSC tomorrow, we will have a little lunch and maybe do some sight seeing. Our check-in time is at 5:30 tomorrow afternoon and induction will begin as early (possibly) as 4:00 Monday morning. Hopefully things will go quickly since I have been having contractions off and on all day. :)

We will be updating as much as we possibly can through the delivery and beyond. Thank you for all of your prayers!!

Charleston Bound!!

The results are in, and Rebekah's lungs are fully developed and mature!! Which means that we are heading to Charleston today (Saturday) to be induced tomorrow (Sunday). Our check-in time is tomorrow afternoon at 5:30, but we are heading down today just as a precaution. I would rather be there in case my contractions get longer/stronger or my water breaks. It's probably a slim chance that either of those would happen between now and tomorrow evening, but we would all rest better if the hospital was across the street and not four hours away!! :)

We will post more updates through tomorrow and Monday, and of course, we will post pictures as soon as we can get some!!! :)

If you haven't posted a guess at Rebekah's birth weight/height, scroll down a couple of posts and leave your guess. Only a couple more days to guess!

Nancy

Nothing New......

Well, the answer from the first preliminary testing is sit and wait for the results of the second test! Not really what we were hoping for, but at least we will get to go to the VBS program tonight with the boys.

We should have the results of the more in-depth test by noon tomorrow and at that point we will see what the plan is from there.

If you haven't seen the post below, check it out and cast your vote for Rebekah's birth weight/height. :)

Nancy

A little "weight"-ing game!

Yes, I know it is almost 5:00 in the morning, but I woke up thinking of things to do and couldn't go back to sleep! :) Not that I'm excited about the possibility of having our baby girl sometime today. Nah, not me!!

Anyway, I meant to post this to the update last night and forgot, so I'll do it now! Before our amniocentesis yesterday, Vickie did a quick measurement for us to see how big Rebekah might be. Rebekah wasn't perfectly cooperative, but the measurements showed her to be somewhere between 5 lbs. 9 ozs. and 5 lbs. 13 ozs. Of course, measuring in utero is not always accurate or sometimes even close (Caleb was measured at 6 and 1/2 pounds, and he was born at 8 lbs. 5 ozs.!).

If you would like to play along, leave a comment in the comments section (just click on the bottom of the post where it says "comments" and use your google account to sign in, or leave an anonymous comment with your name included). In your comment, guess how much Miss Bekah will weigh at birth and how long/tall she will be. I will post the winner who guesses exactly or comes closest to her actual birth weight and length sometime after delivery. Happy guessing!! :)

Nancy

P.S. If we don't end up going to Charleston today, I will re-open the guessing game the day before our actual delivery day so you will have a chance to guess again.

We're Ready!

Our bags are packed, Rebekah's room is ready, and now we are waiting to see when she will arrive! Because the amniocentesis was done so late in the day, we will not have the results back until sometime tomorrow morning. If Rebekah "passed" (her lungs are fully mature), we will be heading to Charleston sometime tomorrow for an induction. If not, we will be waiting either for me to go into labor or until her lungs are more developed, whichever comes first. We are really hoping that her lungs are completely developed so we don't have to play a guessing game as to when I might go into labor and we have to rush to Charleston!

Definitely a girl's closet! :)

There are still more things that are going to be put up on Bekah's walls, but we are still waiting on them to be completed. For now, her room is "done" and we are excited about her coming home to stay in it! If you can't see well enough in the picture, the lamp has butterflies in the shade that shine through when the light is turned on. It is really cute! :)

Please continue to keep us in your prayers as this might be a very big weekend! We will continue to update with any new information as we get it.

Nancy

Waiting no longer!

We are leaving in a few minutes to have the amniocentesis done at Dr. Greig's office. Will update everyone on what the results are when we have them. We might know something as early as tonight or possibly not until Saturday. So, I guess in some ways, we will still be waiting! :)

Nancy

Waiting Game

There's not really much to update at this exact moment, except to say that I am now 2 cm dilated! I am waiting on a return phone call from Dr. Greig to determine if we will be doing an amniocentesis tomorrow or waiting until Monday, which was the original plan. We will be sure to post more information when we have it!! :)