The Hospital Stay

Of course Jonathan and I had a long night, but we enjoyed snuggling our new son.

Jonathan said he's already taking after his Mama here, sleeping with his mouth open.  Hey, you can't breathe toward the end of pregnancy!

The next day was a big day.  Daddy took Ellison to school to show off a picture of her new brother, and ironically the letter of the week was "M" for Marek. :-)  Poor Marek got his circumcision done, and as they told us, he would sleep most of the day after getting Tylenol.  Sleep he did.  We had lots of good friends visit us: Rebecca Sharpe, Angela & Caleb Campbell, Kelly Tooley, and the Barksdales.  Ellison and G & G came back up in the afternoon, too, to hang for a little while.

Ellison still didn't want to hold or kiss Marek, but she did agree to help me get him dressed.

Ever since, Ellison is now our go-to girl for snapping onesies and outfits.  It's her favorite way of helping.

Our little man, in a shirt that used to be little Jack's shirt (thanks, Rebecca!).

Our first family shot.  Ellison acted like me and Marek had the plague, and we BARELY got her to do this.  She wanted nothing to do with having a family photo the day before.

I love that he looks like he's smirking in this one...

Enjoying some Steak 'N Shake.  I cannot believe how ferocious my appetite was in the hospital!  I even inhaled hospital food as if they were my last meals.

Grandma getting some snuggle time.

Oh, I can just feel that fresh skin on my lips when I look at the pic...

The rest of the night was terrible.  I was crying, Jonathan was trying to tell our newborn, "That's enough.  Come on, now.  That's enough, " when he was crying.  I was already emotional, and then I couldn't believe he didn't have more sympathy for our poor baby who had his boyhood cut earlier in the day, and HELLO - he's a baby!!!  Yet, I wanted him to stop crying, too.  He was extremely fussy that night.  I was feeling terrible because I didn't seem to have enough to breastfeed him with.  We got almost no sleep that second night.  Finally at about 3am, feeling like we had no idea what we were doing, feeling frustrated beyond belief, one of the nurses told us the second night is usually the worst night, and it's especially bad for little boys who have been circumcised.  Well, that would have been nice to gear up for had we known.  Anyway, for some reason for me, night always felt daunting.  Don't get me wrong, we were THRILLED and SO thankful to have Marek here.  But it's a tough transition.  Morning finally came, and tired as I was, I was glad daytime was here again. I just wanted to take our baby home and jump into being a family.

[January 19, 2011]