Becoming a Family of Four with a Newborn and Two Year Old

Who doesn’t love a good birth story? In honor of two very special boys that impacted my career and contributed greatly to what is now Learning Motherhood. I’m sharing my second son’s birth story written two and half years ago. 

 I was still in birthday celebrations for my newly two-year-old and a day away from my scheduled C-Section I noticed I was consciously taking in every moment of my toddler and our family of 3. I knew that as of tomorrow everything was going to change and my attention with one would forever be divided by two. There are these moments in life that I have been blessed to be very aware of, allowing me the opportunity to appreciate what is happening and this was one of them. It was like I was taking in a very long deep breath, but I didn’t want exhale. I love that I can go into my memory and replay that day in my head like a video. The prepping mentally for Theo’s arrival was as good as it was going to get. The next day I embraced my two-year-old son for the last time with my unborn child and looked at his ocean blue eyes to tell him that today was the day we meet your brother. I’m 100% sure he didn’t understand fully what was going on, but a rush of excitement filled my heart on what those eyes would see later that day.
 

Theodore was born on February 25th, 2016. As much as I hoped that my second delivery would give me the birth experience that I had longed for with my first child it was clear that was just not in the cards for me. I want to say I have come to terms with the loss of not having a vaginal birth but honestly as I type this, I don’t think I ever will. Although I can tell you that I’m at peace with the fact that it’s just not a part of my journey. Theodore was 6 days past his due date when he came into this world. I heard so many times that second babies come early well this little guy did not want to leave the comforts of my wound. My first child had his 2nd birthday on February 23rd and I seriously walked all over California Adventure for the entire day 4 days past my due date and yet no labor. I had a midwife visit our home as well as consult with me on ways that I could participate in moving the process along into labor but still no labor. My OBGYN and I had discussed months ago what was her comfort level with a VBAC delivery after my due date. She was willing to go up 7 days past my due date but if no labor occurred by then we would need to move to a C- Section. With that in mind we scheduled a C-Section for February 25th and while I had a C-Section with my first it was not planned so picking my son’s birthday felt so strange to me it was hard to wrap my head around it. But the 25th had significance as we were married on June 25th so we went that February 25th which would also give us the needed time in the hospital before my mom would have to go back to the East Coast.
 

The day I entered the hospital for Theo’s birth I kept hoping that by some miracle I would go into labor and even began sobbing in the prep room while the nurse was getting me ready for surgery. She didn’t really understand why I had started crying she asked if she had done something to hurt me and I replied no this just wasn’t supposed to be how I gave birth. I don’t think she understood but I looked at my husband and he knew that I needed a minute to just grieve from what I had wanted this birth to look like. He politely asked the nurse if we could have a moment alone and I’ll never forget what he said to me with the biggest smile,

“Kim, today you and I get to meet our son. I cannot wait for the moment that we can hold him. You are an amazing mom and we are in this together.”

I realized in that moment a healthy boy that I can hold and share with our family was ultimately what I needed. Within an hour and ½ of being in the hospital Theo was born. The hours after his birth are so incredibly memorable to me and very different then with my first as it was all a fog due to the length of time I labored and what my body went through to ultimately end up with a C-Section. The newborn smell of Theo hit me like the smell of jasmine in late spring something I don’t have strong memories of with Oliver. I instantly wanted him to be as close as he could be to me and I couldn’t get enough of the softness of his skin. Meanwhile he was not thrilled that he had been taken from his warm cozy home in my wound and spent the next hour and ½ crying. For some reason I wasn’t fearful of his cry and while the nurses continued to reassure us everything was fine with him, I just felt that the three of us would work it out together. It was a new level of motherhood confidence that became present for me and I welcomed it. With that confidence, I could enjoy our time together in the first days of his birth and dismiss the nervous energy that had been a huge part of Oliver’s birth.  
 
After his arrival, I spent the first week in what felt like motherhood bliss something I missed with my first son. Overall it was a pleasant transition, of course sleep deprivation wasn’t ideal, but we were prepared for what this looked like the second time around. We kept our older son’s routine as much the same as we could, and he adapted well to his brother being a part of the family. I have all these great pictures of him trying to be like mom with his own little baby. He was quite entertaining with the things he would do to mimic me including feeding his baby with the My Breastfriend, wearing his baby, and putting his baby to sleep.
 

We were now a family of four and enjoying our time together. I was surprised at how well everyone adapted to Theo’s arrival. I was surprised at how great I felt in that first week compared to what we had gone through with Oliver the first time around. I was surprised at how our family unit was becoming that much stronger as we all leaned on one another. Although there were challenges and breastfeeding was one of them, adjusting to not being with Oliver as much was another, and being home with two very young kids. But for the moment we were in a wonderful bliss of newborn excitement and it was nice to just have the time to enjoy it.