The Dettinger Baby Quiz

  In these baby pictures you will find Josh, Kelly, Shane, Marissa and Sadie; the task at hand is to see if you can tell which one is each of us.  Good Luck because Josh has a little trouble sometimes.  Just list 1-5 and your best guess.  One of them is a lot easier than the rest.  Make your best guess and then scroll down to find the answers, no cheating.

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Here is your second question to the quiz, who wrote this post?

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Answers: 1. Marissa, 2. Shane, 3. Sadie, 4. Kelly, 5. Josh (if there was any doubt)

Sadie Jo Dettinger

Warning:  This is a birth story, so if that grosses you out, just skip to the pictures:)

Wednesday, March 20th was my due date, and I was scheduled to be induced the next day.  At my appointment on Monday I was dilated to a 3-4, but I was pretty sure nothing would be happening and I would make it to my induction.  In fact, I was almost hoping for that because I had everything lined up for the kids and Josh's schedule, and I had an important meeting on Wednesday morning that I really didn't want to rearrange.  Around noon on Wednesday my friend Sarah called to see if we wanted to meet them at McDonalds for lunch.  I said sure, and got up to get my things together.  About a minute later I called her back and said, "ummm, I think my water just broke."  So she came to pick up the kids and take them and I called Josh to come home, by this time a couple minutes had passed and I was almost positive my water had indeed broken.  I hadn't had any contractions since it broke, but I was kind of in shock.  My body doesn't do this on it's own!  I was so sure of that that I hadn't even packed my bag or anything, so I ran around trying to get everything ready for me and for the kids and Josh and I headed to the hospital.

We waited in the screening room to do a few tests and make sure my water had broken.  It had, and there was meconium in it (her poop), and I knew I was positive for Group B Strep, so it was a sure thing we were staying and having the baby.  They started me on the antibiotics and told me that we could wait and see if my body would start things on its own.  So we waited, and walked around, and tried to get things moving.  I was having some contractions and I got to a 5, but I knew things would have to get going more than they were.  I was not really in too much pain at all, but I was starving because in the midst of all the excitement I had never eaten lunch and couldn't now, and I was getting tired.  I was having a hard time relaxing because I had a lot of things on my mind with all the stuff we've had going on lately, and Sarah called to ask if she could give Marissa some medicine because she had a fever.  I felt really bad about leaving her with someone sick and there not really being anything we could do about it, and what we would do with them the next day, etc. etc.  But thankfully I have the best husband ever who knew how to get me to relax and forget about everything else, a great nurse, and the world's most awesome friend who made me feel like it was no big deal to watch my sick kid overnight and who I knew they would be comfortable with.  Around 8 pm I decided to start the pitocin so we wouldn't be there forever and I would still have some energy, and the contractions started gradually picking up to where they needed to be. 

I was pretty sure I wanted to try this labor without the epidural again because it went really well that way with Marissa, but I wasn't necessarily against getting one either.  I am kind of lucky in that I feel like I am really not very uncomfortable until I get to a 7 or so, and even after that the pain is manageable and the last part goes fairly quickly.  I figured it wasn't so awful that I really wanted to get a huge needle in my back and knew I would get that huge adrenaline rush after if I didn't get one.  The nurse was really helpful with everything and helped me use a birthing ball to mix things up at the end and I think that helped too.  Also, when I was getting close to pushing she put up this bar thing at the foot of the bed that I could grab onto above me and kind of squat and that helped too.  I feel like the pushing went a lot better with this labor, it felt more effective this way than laying down, though they did make me lay down for the last couple pushes.  The doctor was a really good coach though helping me with when to push and breathe and stop etc. and I was really happy to do it without an episiotomy, just a couple small tears, and with probably 8 or so pushes.  She came at 12:10 am on March 21st, just 10 minutes shy of her due date:) I did get pretty shaky afterwards and it stung pretty bad after, but I did get that huge relief when she came out and recovered really quickly.  Yes it can be painful, but it is kind of awesome to feel your body do what it was meant to do and what a miracle it all is, and I feel grateful to be able to get to experience it.  And to have such a cute little babe at the end of all it :) 

Sadie was 8 pounds 1 ounce and 20 1/2 inches long (my smallest baby yet!)

                     

Match Day!!

 

Yesterday the long anticipated Match Day finally came!  We had found out on Monday that we matched somewhere, and had to wait til Friday to find out where.  I had thought it would be torturous, and partly it was, but after hearing from so many people who didn't match it made me so grateful we had a job somewhere that I didn't really care where it was.  Josh had the day off so we took the kids to story time at the library in the morning to pass the time and then headed off to the Match party his hospital was throwing.  We had pizza (and obviously Shane had cake frosting) and chatted nervously with friends while we waited for 1 o'clock.  (Marissa looks thrilled to have her picture taken huh?)  At 1 we hit refresh, refresh, refresh on Josh's phone til we got the email that told us we're going to Fort Wayne, Indiana! 

We were pretty excited because that was the place we ranked #1.  Haven't heard of it?  Yeah, I hadn't either til we started looking into programs.  But it was overwhelmingly our favorite for a bunch of reasons:

 

-the program is a perfect fit for Josh.  He really wanted a program where family medicine was the only residency so the residents get to do a ton of stuff without having to compete with other residencies for it.  It is actually a fairly large city with 250,000 people so there is a really good variety of patients and a decent sized Spanish speaking population, which he wanted too.  He rotated there for a month so he really got to see the program and saw how the residents could get training in all kinds of procedures that would help make their future practice even more profitable (he could even get enough training in c-sections to do those if he wanted to- he doesn't :) )    

 

-cost of living is very affordable and there are a lot of nice areas to live

 

-they have a great zoo (perfect for my animal-obsessed little boy), 3 YMCA's, lots of running/biking trails/parks, a nice baseball field/minor league baseball team, and lots of good shopping and restaurants, including a Costco which they are building in the fall (I am so excited for that!) 

 

-they offer a lot of extra benefits like a housing stipend, sign-on bonus, etc.

 

-we really like the residents and everyone involved with the program.  The coordinator has already been great to work with, she has a couple kids with celiacs and knows Josh is so at second look she had a ton of gluten free stuff for him.  They even sent us a gift basket over the holidays with popcorn, candy, and other goodies- how could we not pick them??

 

 

I will stop there, but suffice it to say we are feeling grateful for this opportunity, it really feels like where our family is supposed to be right now.  I am so proud of Josh and all his hard work getting to this point.  (I'm proud of me too, and glad that the time home alone this fall paid off because without a doubt doing the rotation there helped him get his spot.)  We went to celebrate last night at Outback! 







 Josh's last rotation ends at the end of April and we will move the first part of May- so it is on to house hunting (rentals), getting ready to move, and, oh yeah, having a baby!!!  If I haven't gone into labor by Thursday I am getting induced then, so stay tuned! 

 

Life Right Now

Surprisingly as the time passes and we get closer to lots of exciting things coming up, I am getting more and more calm about it all.  I am realizing that a lot of things are going to be changing, not necessarily for better or worse, just different (though let's face it, making money, even if it's not a lot, will definitely be better than acquiring more debt!)  With that in mind, I am getting excited about what the future will bring, but I'm trying to soak up all the little details of our life here and now.  So more for my purposes and not as much for your reading enjoyment( I warned you), I wanted to write down some of the little things that make up our life right now. 

-anytime we go anywhere, I try to give myself at least 5 extra minutes so Shane can fulfill his irresistable urge to "tromp through the snow" before getting in the van.  And so Marissa can fulfill her urge to get in her carseat by herself.

-dinner time can be crazy trying to keep everyone in their seat and feed themselves without spitting out food, complaining, or just generally being loud and obnoxious, but there are a few token meals I can make and know that they will be well received: meatballs and rice, enchiladas (barbecue chicken, honey lime, or regular), cowboy dinner, lasagana, and most variations of chicken and rice.  And on the other side, I pretty much know whenever I try to make any kind of soup, it is almost always not well received, much to my dismay. 

-whenever Josh gets home, the kids run to the door and Marissa shouts a very enthusiastic "Hiiiii!!!!" followed almost immediately by "Do be my baby!  Do be my baby!"  which means she wants to Josh to carry her like a baby, sing his little "be my baby" song he made up, and toss her onto our bed.

-on nights when he has to work, I usually try to distract us by going to the Y or out to fast food, or take advantage of the opportunity to make macaroni and cheese or something else cheap and glutenous. 

-our bedtime routine has evolved into this: around 7:30 or 7:45 the kids clean up all their toys, get pajamas on and teeth brushed.  Then they come sit on the couch and Josh will pull up a youtube video for each of them (this is something Shane insists that daddy is better at doing).  The requests go in cycles but for the past couple weeks Shane asks for a barracuda movie every night (thank goodness youtube has some of everything) and Marissa wants planes (the trailer for the new movie coming out soon).  After that they pick out a "scripture picture" and we talk about it.  Then they do "silly time" where they run around the house like crazy for a couple minutes and then we kneel and say prayer, get drinks, and head upstairs to bed. Marissa wants me to sing her "I Am a Child of God" and I put her in bed, then Shane says his prayer followed by whatever article of faith he is working on and usually requests me to sing ABC's or Once There Was a Snowman (after trying to ask about a bajillion questions in between). 

-Marissa pretty much always takes a shower with me because it is just easier that way, and let's face it, the girl can always use one:)

-Our favorite place to go for a treat these days is Culvers.  If it's a weekend and daddy is home and we have a coupon for buy one get one free concrete mixers, we will go and get two and Josh and I will each take a kid to share with (whoever gets Shane gets a little jipped because that boy can pound it in pretty quickly!)

-We try to go somewhere most mornings- usually Mondays are to the Y and groceries, Tuesdays and Thursdays are preschool, and Fridays are storytime at the library.  Marissa especially loves the Y and I'm sure glad about that, I try to go 4 times a week.

-When the kids wake up, they want to eat immediately and whenever I ask them what they want it's always "a bar! a bar!"  This is usually followed every morning by Shane asking me what he can have now and acting like it's the toughest decision of his life.  I think he's secretly hoping every morning that I will say "let's have cake!" or something like that.

-The kids are always pretending to be some kind of animal and I am usually included in this too.  They love the Bear series of books by Karma Wilson and have created longstanding identities for each of us: Shane is mouse, Marissa is badger, I am hare, Josh is mole, and Sadie is even involved in utero- she is raven.  We all have to go to bear's cave (our closet) or my burrow (the bed) and reenact scenes from the book.