The Strasser's

Baby Evan is 1! I can't believe that he is 1, time has sure went fast. He didn't eat his cupcake like normal 1 year old's, he didn't like the ice cream because of it being cold. He didn't go for it so I stuck a little bit of frosting on my finger and he liked it, but not to sure about it. Than I torn a very small piece to see if he would take a little bit. So hopefully another birthday this summer maybe he will like it.  Here is the birthday boy!

Evan Brent Strasser We have a new addition to our family. Evan Brent Strasser Born: June 7th 12:06 Weight: 2 lbs 6 oz After the C-section On Monday we were having our usual daily ultrasound and Evan wasn't cooperating to how the doctor wanted him to. My blood pressure was raising some. After sometime the doctor decided well it was going to be the day. I was a little nervous because I have never had surgery before. I was really nervous when the doctor said ok it's time. Getting in the operating room, I was really overwhelmed and scared, I wished Cory could be in there while they were prepping me, but he had to wait. He was pretty scared. While the prepping was going they were monitoring my blood pressure and monitoring Evan also. The epidural took them three pokes, I think it was because of the water retention that I had through out body.  During the cesarean I almost fell asleep because of the lack of ...

As I am getting ready for tomorrow, getting the house clean, baking cupcakes. I have been thinking about all that has been going on. Being in the hospital for 3 weeks having to travel two hours both ways to see my baby several phone calls from the NICU doctor's each morning with an update on Evan being away from alyssa and owen for three weeks several doctor's appointments (6 doctor's) It definitely has been an interesting year!

This post was suppose to be posted actually Sunday, June 6th. Which was my bad but at least of somewhat of what had been going on you guys will know. I haven't checked for grammar or misspelled words. Sorry everyone that I haven't really updated. To start off I have been here 2 weeks. I have had another around of steroid shots in my hips and ended up with bruises from those shots already. I have some good bruises from all the poking of needles and the iv things that they have put in. They have put in a pic line, it was an interesting experience getting that in. It's nice though now that I am not getting poked with needles now.  There are some days were I am swollen than others. Which I am not to fond of. Which I am glad will go away after the baby is born. They have had me on the baby monitor constantly. I am allowed to get up to use the bathroom and shower, and do a little bit of moving around in the room. Before I was able to go for wheelchair rides which a...

Well to start off. The past couple of days I had been dealing with migraine's. I can't remember which day it was but I was given a drug and I had a reaction to it. I felt like I was going to jump out of my skin, it was just not a good feeling.  I am not even going to try and spell it. So yesterday I was having yet another migraine, and tylenol was tried and some oxycodon (sp?) and those two did not work really for me. So from what I was told the drug that was given to me the other day I thought they put it on the did not give list, but the doctor that was on, and she was on the same night I was actually given the drug, was trying to give it to me a again but with benadryl at the sametime. I didn't feel good about even trying it again so I told them no.  The nurse said if I had the same reaction I wouldnt take it again either. So they tried something else but I got it in my hip. But they still  gave me benadryl just in case. Which I was glad in case something didn't work...

Well today is going good so far. Test results looked good. Still on the waiting game. I really want to go home! I have thought about and I haven't changed a diaper in a week. Kind of miss it but kind of not, because of poopie diapers. I kind of hope to have the baby soon because I am getting tired of the hospital but I want to wait a little longer because than it will be better for the baby each day. It's going to be whole lot different when I am out of the hospital and get back on a schedule. And I had actually been talking about wanting to go a on a vacation before this hospital stay and this is not the vacation I was wanting. :)  Well that is it so far for an update!

Well I am so overwhelmed right now, lots to say. Hmmm.....to start with the good news or bad. I will start off with the good news. Evan did really with his echo and also with ekg. All the nurses and his doctor think he is adorable, as usual they commented on his eyelashes. :) But who wouldn't because they are amazing. Well I guess it's not really bad news. She did here that the duct is still open and his left ventricle is mildly enlarged. So he will be having the procedure to close the duct. She also said that closing the duct will help him grow better because with the duct being open can make his heart work a little harder to work than it should. The sooner they get this done the better. It's good that they are on top of making sure that his heart sounds good. Because if it doesn't get taken care of, than he could have heart problems when he is older. One of the procedure's that I remember talking about last time was going through a vein in his leg and going up...

Last night Heather's BP started rising.  She had a head ache and was a little queasy.  They gave her normal dose early then gave her another dose shortly after.  She is only on 100 mg  every 8 hrs and I know they can go as high as 600mg doses.  This morning her pb was high and morning should be the lowest point in the day.  They changed her dose to 200 every 6 hrs.  Heather has to wait until her bp goes down to have breakfast.  They are real cautious about giving her food in case she has to have a cesarean some time.  I was supposed to go home this morning and do some work and see the children.  The doctor said I should wait an hour to make sure her bp goes down first and her headache goes away.  They still have a lot more they can do to control her pb.

Tomorrow Evan and I are making a trip to Doernbecher's for a check-up with his cardiologist. He will have an echo before his appointment so they can have a look at his heart. Last time when we were in, they listened to his heart but they couldn't hear the PDA . The doctor said well we can't say if it's gone or not. So we will see tomorrow. 

Well I have been working on solid food's with Evan and he only likes certain foods. He has had a taste of the kids Popsicle and liked them both for the flavor and because he his teething. His favorite food's right now are: oatmeal  (sometimes with applesauce)       carrots        sweet potatoes         applesauce a new food he tried today, banana with mixed berry. He basically ate the whole thing expect for what is on his onesie. Food's he dislikes: green beans      peas I couldn't find a clean bib so I figured I would just swing it without one thinking he would be just fine. And here is the result of that. getting ready for a bath

Well here is another entry from my hospital blog. I wanted to add them to this blog as mentioned before. But as also a count down to having Evan what we had been going through. Well just playing the waiting game now. I am taking blood pressure meds and just taking it easy. Than so often I put the baby monitor on for like an hour or two. But they always have some trouble getting it where we can keep tabs on him, because he is such a wiggly baby.  Nothing really much is going on. I know not much of an update. So yes for sure it is a boy! A name hasn't been decided yet.

Well I guess I need to start thinking about Evan's birthday to do something or not to do something. Any suggestions? I think we need to celebrate some how but not sure fully how. 

That is all the entries that were blogged on one day. More to come this week.   I wanted to add all of the  hospital entries to this blog now that it is not a public blog.

All of Heather's test have been improving.  Thanks for the prayers, love and support.  While my Mom, Dad, and Aleta were here the doctor told us that the protein test came out normal.  The doctor was so suprised that she had them double check the calculations. (Aparently their is more then one way to calculate this and she wanted to confirm the test was calculated using the method she desired).  A nurse told us it was possible that with that test improving so much heather might be able to go home on bed rest.   Unfortunetely, when the test was recalculated the protein was just above what is considered very high.  Still, this was lower then before and her other test, liver... also improved.  The doctor reaffirmed that heather will not be leaving until the baby is born.  She says you can be doing fine and four hours later have huge problems and need the baby to be delivered.  She says you just can't tell, it's very unpredictable, thus hea...

So for a little update they took me off the magnesium sulfate for now and the liquids in the iv, for now. Test results are looking right now. I feeling less groggy and all the other side effects are wearing off.  They also took me off the baby monitor .

So the doctor came and talked to us this morning.  She said that the steroids they gave Heather often temprarily improve the preclaptia.  While she is glad to see heather is doing good she believes that this is partly due to the steroids and within a day or two the steroids will start to wear off and then Heather's condition will continue to deteriorate.  The doctor said that Heather has severe precamptia and that typically women in her condition don't last more then 3-5 days before they need to deliver the baby.  She said sometimes women last a week or a few weeks but that is more rare.  I was hoping that since Heather was improving this would mean that she would last for a few weeks or more but I guess that probably won't happen. The baby is in the 23 percentile for weight.  The doctor said this is part of the preclampia.  It restricts blood flow to the organs.  The restricted blood flow effects all organs and the babies growth.  Hea...

Alyssa and Owen are staying with Heather's mom Cindy.  Alyssa was quite upset to hear the baby is a boy.  She has been expecting a girl and has had now doubts about he baby's sex.  Alyssa got over the bad news and now insist that we name the baby spiderman.  We started video chating with the children yesterday and did it again this morning.  Owen was really excited to see us.  We used skype.  The internet here is really slow and so the webcam was running at the poorest quality setting.  Aleta is going to bring our clear internet which will be much faster and then we should have a high quality video feed.  We are going to have the children visist for a few minutes in person today.   Heather needs to avoid excitement so it will be a short visit. We really aren't supposed to have visitors but people have been coming for short visits.  When heather's condition worsens we will not allow any ...

Heather started some sort of magnesium drug.  It suppresses her nervous system which relaxes her, it also has been shown to help the baby's brain when given shortly before delivery.  Due to the drug the last post that heather wrote was quite unreadable before I edited it.  She has a hard time concentrating enough to get through writing a post.   The magnesium also makes her hot and her face is a little red and flushed.  Last night her face was really red and I thought she had a fever.  The nurse took her temp and it was fine.  She looks better now.      This drug has a tendency to create fluid in th lungs.  They are monitoring heather's oxyigen in her blood to ensure that she is getting enough o2.  They said given the amount of oxygen in her blood they can tell that there is no flood in her lungs.  They are counting every ml of fluid she drinks.  She gets to drink very little.  If they ...

So a year ago our hospital adventures started. It has been interesting  to re-read all of these entries and all the things we have been through. To start off  so everyone know's I was admitted to the hospital late Thursday night around 7:30. (Which would have been May 20th) A urinne test came back with high protein on tuesday.  They should have admitted me a couple of days ago. So I started dealing with high blood pressure, and I ended up doing a urine test towards the end of last week. The results came back for that test Monday but the doctor didn't come in until Tuesday and then finally, I got a call Thursday night around 5:00. So back to the results, which was high protein in the urine. Thursday night I was started on medication for High blood pressure and than I was given a shot of steriods for the baby. this helps develop the baby's lunds for a premature delivery.  My blood pressure has dropped and they are glad....