Rhys Jae Lee day 2.
Rhys was born at 3:41pm on Wednesday.
I got induced the evening before, with a foley balloon catheter & pitocin. I spent that whole night having contractions, and after only getting an hr of sleep, I got the epidural at 8am the next day. He came out about 8 hrs later.

I was relatively chill throughout the whole process. I had been waiting anxiously to finally have my baby and wasn't really that nervous about the giving birth part. Brian as my partner in crime was a whole different story. He was probably 100 times more unreliable than I expected him to be throughout the labor/birth.
The second I felt Rhys pop out of my body, I burst into uncontrollable tears and wept like a baby for a good 3 minutes. It was the relief that I finally brought him out into the world and all the emotional torment was over. They took him away right away to have him examined, as there were a team of about 6 or 7 pediatric doctors standing by to check him out, because of his asymmetrical iugr diagnosis. Brian was able to walk over and check Baby out, while I sat there getting my placenta pulled out and stitched up. I looked over to hopefully overhear that there was nothing wrong with him. Brian looked over at me and mouthed that Noma didn't look weird to him at all.
He was perfect. A whopping 5 pounds and 7 ounces. His head was not disproportionately big to a tiny body and limbs. He is small but he is perfect and healthy. My baby boy.
The rest of the day I spent my time being transferred to our post partum room, getting a bite to eat, telling everyone Noma was here, and basically just living in the happiness and relief that our son was finally with us and in good shape. I loved him so much and I stared at him unceasingly as he slept in his little box. Then at the advice of other parents, we had him sent away to the nursery at night, so that we could get some sleep, too. They brought him back a couple of times in the middle of the night, so that I could feed him. The nurses said it was okay and that he was in no hurry to eat. So we didn't worry and we just sent him back and went to sleep until morning.
When morning came I felt a little better, and Noma stayed with us for the rest of the day, except for when he went to get his circumcision. I actually took a shower, and was able to walk around the room. I tried to feed him, and when I failed because he was too sleepy, we spent hours doing skin to skin.
The past several months were spent in anticipation of my son who I would love so much. Yesterday, I felt a fierce love of a mom as his protector and care taker. Today I am overwhelmed by my love for my son. I thought it was already at it's full capacity, but right now I know it is a love much bigger than I could have ever imagined, and it is one that makes me feel immensely vulnerable and helpless, and when the nurse took Rhys to get weighed and tested for jaundice just for two hours, instead of getting some sleep, I cried uncontrollably and spent that time looking at the hundreds of pictures I had taken of him in the past couple of days.

---fast forward to today, at 1 wk! 
We came home from the hospital on Friday and it was so awesome as I still had my adrenalin rush going. Sure I was up all night staring at his face to make sure he was breathing, but who needs sleep anyway, right? Our family and friends came over to love on him. Little man was asleep 90% of the time. The doctors had said it was because he was still gestationally young, and would have spent that time sleeping inside my womb anyway. Getting him to eat was so incredibly difficult, but we didn't worry much.
Then Monday rolled around, and after our visit with the pediatrician, we were re-admitted to pediatrics because homie had jaundice and had lost too much weight. Sad face. I was so, so sad because I already felt like a failure as a mom. Brian and I silently packed up to go back to the hospital. I was so emotionally drained, physically tired, and in much more pain than when I had come home.  I was wishing we were on our way to getting the hang of things yet we were backtracking. At that moment I was at a complete low, and my husband turned to me and said "We are so blessed." UGLY CRY TIME.
Though he was a horrible husband during labor and delivery (slept 19 hrs), Brian is proving to be such a good daddy. During the time he was home, he manned all the diaper changes, cleaning all the bottles and pumping supplies, doing all the baby laundry. 

A letter to my unborn son.

Hi Noma,

It’s me, Mom!

In less than a week’s time, you will be in my arms, having just turned our world’s completely upside down. I am so so excited!

The past 8 or so months have been insane, as we were not prepared for the journey your little self would take us.

Leading up to pregnancy, I told myself I wanted to be one of those chill girls who doesn’t act like she’s the first person on the planet to get pregnant, but now looking back at 37 weeks, it kind of turned into that. J Oh well.

Your stay in my belly has been quite eventful, and I’m sorry if you felt all the turbulence that went on. The 20 insane weeks of vomiting and being sick were bearable, but I can’t help but think that all the stress that I dealt with had an effect on you. The doctor’s say there was no cause, but my mommy heart can’t help but constantly think to myself, “what if I just let those things go and focused more on growing you inside”. 

My hope is that you come out and you shock everyone by being a good sized, normal boy! If not, that’s okay too.  If all else fails, you can blame your Dad… who, until yesterday, told me you’re small because he was a tiny baby at barely over 6 pounds. Well guess what? We found his birth certificate yesterday and he was 7 pounds and 7 ounces! Bigger than me! Haha.

Noma, I hope you’re ready to come out… because we are ready for you to hurry up and join our family! This year, 6 of your cousins were born! -with one still on the way! Sure, they are all in different parts of the world, but it is definitely a record for us. I can’t wait for you to make relationships with them and to watch you grow up having so much fun with your cousins. J Not to mention your grandparents are super ecstatic about your impending arrival, and you are already so loved by so many aunties and uncles. Do me a favor and grow up chak-hae so you can continue to be easily loved. I will try to teach you all the Korean etiquette and manners, so you can blend those things in with your Dad’s ways that I’m sure you’ll take after. We saw your face in an ultrasound last week, and you look just like him already! He said you look like a weasel; little does he know he looks like a weasel, too. Hehe.

Oh! I forgot to mention! You also have a big sister that I hope you really really love. Right now I think she is feeling a certain way because she senses that something major is about to happen, but I think you guys will really really love each other. She is an awesome doggy, and right now she is Mommy’s best companion, but if you want to steal her to be your best friend instead, I can deal with that. What’s mine is yours.

Noms, I’m not going to be the world’s most perfect mom. I have enough trouble taking care of myself, and I was even voted “Most likely to never grow up” in high school. I’m super childish, immature, and often times still count on Grandma or Dad to take care of my crap. Hopefully these mother instincts kick in naturally. All I can say is that I will try my best. I will try to be patient and think of you before I think of my own needs, I will try to make sure you grow up eating healthier than I did, and I will try to create a happy and inspiring environment for you to flourish in. Dad and I already have so many things we want to teach you.  At times we may be lazy or short to anger, but please don’t take those things to heart. It will be a learning process for us, too.

Noms, my son! You are everything I ever wanted in this world! The love of our lives! I didn't know it until recently, but you are. I am going to love you so fiercely! Until it is time to let you go and be some lucky girl’s husband. Then I will try to back off and be a chill mother-in-law so your wife doesn’t give you crap. Please come out healthy and strong!

It's been a long time!

How are you guys? Haha.

We're good. Really. So, so much better.

As exhausting as the bi-weekly visits to multiple doctors have been, the constant checkups have been reassuring and comforting to my worry wart self.
Every week, we have been getting the "great news" that my placenta is calcifying (dying) more and more, and that the time when Noma gets to come out is nearing. The reason that such not good news is good news is because it gives us more confidence that his size is a nutrition issue and not something scarier that is irreversible. He is officially still growing *s.l.o.w.l.y. and at every NST, his heart beat is good and his fluids are stellar. So proud of Baby Boy for doing so great under the crappy circumstances and crossing my fingers that he will get to be 5 pounds by the time he comes out!

The high-risk doc said I can even make it to 38 wks before we take him out (if i'm lucky), but that is the maximum,  which means, the time is really near.. since I will be 36 in 2 days! We are thinking it will happen some time during Thanksgiving week. She can't tell us till a few days prior, but I guess there is a wait with all pregnancies anyway. Shoutout to my cousin who just had hers at 41+ wks. lol Crazy how time flies. I am definitely not as big as other preggos (well I am, but not my belly), but I am surely feeling all the discomforts of end of pregnancy. Waking up in the middle of the night from crazy charlie horses in my calves, in pain when I drive, and my little homie's rear end is stuck near my left rib cage. Most recently, I had a cold and horrible cough that lasted about 12 days and I can't tell you how annoying it was to have such frequent accidents from coughing so much. Tmi? Haha.

Anyhow, people keep asking if I am nervous. NOT AT ALL! Maybe I will start to be when the date is  actually set, but for now, I am SO ready for pregnancy to be OVER and to finally meet this little dude.  I am sure I will regret saying this when I'm a zombie from no sleep etc., but seriously, these last several months have been so hard on us emotionally, I can't wait to just see that he is okay with my own eyes and love on him. Yeah, total mama's boy in the making already. The stroller and car seat  are set up, the nursery is 90% done, and I am just washing his laundry daily prepping for his arrival. Gifts from friends and family all over the world keep coming in everyday, and it just makes me so happy that everyone is so excited for his arrival. Hopefully he grows up to be a good kid that knows how to reciprocate all this love. :)

What else. The weeks are long being unable to do much except go to the doctor (except for Tuesdays which is the day Mom comes over and basically does everything for me :) She is the absolute best.) , but the weekends have been pretty great lately. Brian took a day off last week and took me to Disneyland since our passes expire soon, and even though we only got to ride "Small World", it was nice and definitely made my week feel shorter. Then my nephew and niece were born- on the SAME DAY!- to their respective moms lol, and I spent Friday and Saturday visiting my brand new, gigantic but adorable nephew at the hospital. They were both quite eventful birth stories but I am so thankful everyone is okay and the babies are healthy.

The weekends have also been great lately because of friends. Friends seriously make the world go round. Living in Redondo is great for us but not really ideal for others and I have actually had friends joke that they'll only come hang out with us when we move closer to the freeway lol, and since we aren't really able to go out much ourselves, we haven't been reaching out to people or going out of our way to do anything. But unexpectedly, some of our friends have been spending their weekends coming all the way to South Bay to have dinner with us or just drink beers at home with Brian, and it really has done so much to take the edge off of everything. I can tell that  Blee is just so much giddier after spending time with people other than his jjing jjing wife, and we have really been able to enjoy this time we have left as non-parents. Yesterday, our friends dropped by to have dinner with us, and after dinner, we went to Target altogether and had the time of our lives. Then we went our separate ways, got home, and they were outside our door again. To use the restroom. We thought it was so weird, but appreciated the company. After a couple of beers and mindless conversation, it turned out they just wanted to spend some time praying for us. What the! I probably would have cried right then and there if it wasn't so awkward, but it was. This was a first for us, as our group of friends is not necessarily the most God centered group of friends out there. So I imagine it was much harder for them to approach us about it than it was for us to receive it. If you guys are reading this, thank you so much for that prayer. I am feeling so empowered and rejuvenated by it. Anyhow, after they left, I spent the rest of the night partially giggling at how they kinda Jehovah's witnessed us (Blee called it prayer-rape -_-), but also spent the rest of the night thanking my lucky stars -- God of course,  and reflected upon how he has really used this pregnancy to show me how blessed I am. I have really learned how to just rely on him and let him do the rest. When things are out of your  control, there really isn't much else you can do but have faith. Through this time, we have also really seen an outpour of love from our friends and our family, and on an even more personal level, I have grown more thankful and more certain that I made the right choice in marrying the dude I married, as he has been so optimistic and level-headed during this time. Sure he is annoying 80% of the time with  comments like "you seem to have all the pregnancy symptoms out of convenience" or "let me raise the volume on the radio so I can drown you out", and he is surely driving me crazy with all the links to portable heaters he wants to buy when we really don't need one, but he is fosho the man God hand-picked for me.

This will most likely be my last post before baby RJL comes to join us, (yes, we have a real name! stay tuned :P) but I hope to continue this blog after he comes out, too. Hopefully it can be more of a real entertaining blog and less of a pregnancy-mom blog, but I doubt it. Pray for us, friends! Spawn is coming!

Hi guys.

I was so touched last week by all the friends who reached out to me with messages of encouragement and concern. Thank you so, so much. They really helped me out so much and fed me with a lot of optimism and positivity.

Just thought I should update you all. My doctor ended up calling me back that day and referred me to see another specialist at a fetal center. To put it simply, a doctor for high-risk pregnancies. I know it sounds super scary, but I guess it’s always better to be safe and take precaution.

Fast forward to today’s appointment; Brian and I were optimistic last week and hoping for just a smaller baby, being that Brian was born quite small himself. After a more thorough exam today, they found that Noms is pretty consistently in the 20^th percentile which is OK, but there were some areas that were more concerning.

I will just put it simply, she gave me three possible scenarios.

The first- best case scenario, is that he is just a really small Asian baby.

Second- chromosome issues. I had the genetic testing done at around 10 weeks and was cleared for syndromes and defects, but this does not mean that we are totally in the clear. The test that I took specifically specialized in detecting down syndrome, and that doesn’t seem to be the case, but the doctor mentioned that it could be something else, ie: dwarfism. This is not what she thinks, but just a possibility.

Lastly, and this the most likely scenario, is that my placenta is ceasing to work. She found that my placenta was thickening, which means it is not functioning as well. My amniotic fluid was also low, which is why we have not been able to see his face in the ultrasounds. Apparently, you need to have a lot of fluid around the face for it to show well. This is not good news, obviously. A not functioning placenta and low amniotic fluid is dangerous to the baby, and it also means he is not getting enough nutrition, which is probably why he isn’t growing much.

Unfortunately, there is nothing I can do to make my placenta work again. I actually asked her if it would help if I ate more, but if the placenta isn’t working, the extra food I eat would only go to me, and not Noma, so it’s pretty pointless.

Obviously I felt so bad, like the worst mother ever, but she told me it is unlikely that I did anything wrong to cause this. Basically, it is what it is.

So what next?

Just a whole lot of monitoring.  I will be going to see both this specialist and my regular OB once a week each. Thank the Lord I don’t work, because driving to Beverly Hills twice a week from South Bay is so dang tiring. -______- Haha. 

Anyhow, we will have to keep monitoring Noma’s growth very closely, and if he continues to not grow, in other words- if he is being starved, we will probably have to schedule a c-section early so he can come out and finish developing in an incubator.

I have never been pregnant before so this is all very very overwhelming and scary… so continued prayers would be greatly appreciated. Please pray that he develops more and continuous to grow, so that I can carry him to full term. My goal is at least 36 weeks. I hate to sound dramatic, and I also find this all extremely personal to share on the internet, but the only comfort I am finding right now is in the Lord and prayers, which is why I am sharing. Brian and I are disheartened as you can imagine, but there really isn’t anything we can do other than take it easy and hope for the best. So that is what we will continue to do for our boy. 

And so basically that's it as far as today’s update goes. Oh and also, this is kind of weird, but if you are reading this and happen to be mine or Brian’s relative (more so Brian’s I guess), I ask that you keep this news to yourself, as I have not decided at the moment if I would like to share with immediate family just yet (other than my mom- who went to my appt. with me). Still trying to digest all this news and wait for a more productive solution before we tell them. I def don’t want to stress them out with worry.  I think it would stress me out even more. :P Thanks so much, you guys.  I will definitely keep everyone posted.    

What a crazy and humbling past couple of days for our family.

I mentioned before that I had a lot of events coming up, and those events have busily been checked off my list. We had a crazy weekend during the hottest days of our El Niño California summer. 

Saturday I was able to throw my cousin a baby shower for my soon to be nephew, and I must say, it turned out much greater than all of us had anticipated! I am so excited for all that is in store for their growing family. It has been a true blessing to be able to share in this experience together. Afterwards, we drove to Brian's good friend's birthday party and had a lovely time. 

The next day, Brian went out golfing (against my suggestion to rest up and get ready for our big move on Monday), and came home with heatstroke and major allergies. Not to mention Ash was running a fever and vomiting bile all day long from either the previous day's overexcitement & heat, or from all the stress of us packing up boxes to move. To say I was stressed out is an understatement. She continued to vomit through the night, and we all went to sleep (except for when we had to wake up and clean her vomit off the rug at 4am) feeling exhausted and defeated. 

I woke up the next morning, and got ready for my 28wk appt. The dreaded glucose test. As I was getting ready, Ash threw up again! Brian counted and that was the 17th time in less than 24 hours. I couldn't take it anymore, so I called the vet and had B take her in. Not only that, my mom had to rush over so she could watch the movers who were coming at 9am, while I went to my doctor's appointment. 

My ob wasn't in as usual. For some reason, she is always at the hospital for a delivery when it's my appt day. Sucks because how can I even be upset when I know how much more important that is? Lol. Anyhow, I flagged down a nurse and asked if I would be getting another ultrasound, since the last two were a complete fail, with Noms chillin' snug and so low we could never really  get a good look at his face/ profile. Luckily there was availability, and the tech squeezed me in real quick before I had to go in for my glucose test. What do you know, same position. This guy! I asked if it was okay for the baby to be in the same exact position for about 12 wks now, and she assured me it was not abnormal for him to be. However, she kept circling around his body and making a lot of measurements. Instantly I knew something was wrong. I stayed quiet and let her do her thing, and she proceeded to tell me that she would have to discuss a few things with my doctor and have her get back to me. At that moment my heart dropped and everything she said to me after that is a blur. Apparently he is measuring very small, and has not grown much. I don't remember much else after that. I wish blee had been there to listen. She told me there was not much to worry about just yet. Best case scenario is that he is a lot younger than we initially thought. This is not implausible since my cycles are unusually long and my ovulation date could have been a lot later than we calculated. 

Oh man. 

I scurried outta there because she tried to brush it off like it wasn't a big deal, and on my walk over to the lab, tears just started streaming down my face. I'm crying right now as I type this. It really takes something like that to make all the other little things in your life seem so trivial and unimportant. The last several months, I just stressed and stressed about how unhappy I was in our current living situation and cried almost everyday as we struggled to find a home suitable for us. I (gladly and happily) spent all my hours stressing and planning for my best friends' showers. I ate poorly because all I wanted was Korean food and the market was too far to drive to. I was devastated when our babymoon glamping trip had to be cancelled, because that weekend, California randomly decided to have tons of rain and thunderstorms. Most recently I had been so concerned about being a fat bridesmaid, that I had been watching my weight gain. I thought about all these things and the tears wouldn't stop flowing from my eyes. All these stupid concerns, when all I should have been thinking about was how to grow my healthy baby. I felt like the worst mom in the world, and he wasn't even here yet. Meanwhile, Brian was texting me to let me know that Ash had no obstruction in her stomach, but a fever, and that she was being probed with needles and had to be injected with tons of fluids that would be costing us over $800. My poor fur baby. My even poorer bank account! I swallowed my tears as the technician awkwardly tried to make conversation with me as she took my blood, and after that I walked past the waiting room as all the expectant mothers' stared at me and probably worried for their own babies. My bad, seriously. Eventually as I was inquiring about a bill I was mailed, my original OB saw me crying and assured me that the ultrasounds are not always accurate, and at this point she just needs me to rest up, relax, and eat well. I got in my car, grabbed a chicken sandwich meal from chik fil a on the way, and as soon as I got home, I stood in the empty kitchen and scarfed it all down. 

The rest of the day was horrible as you can imagine. The movers had come an hour late, and though they promised they would finish in 3 hours, they took much longer and inside my head I just saw dollar signs. Haha. What an expensive day for us. When they completed everything, we headed over to the new place, and I spent the rest of the day with a huge migraine and just laid down, unwilling and unable to help unpack or clean. I was checked out. 

This morning, we woke up at 7 with the hugest hugest migraines, both Brian and I. Normally I would have just suffered through it and not budged from the bed, but instantly I thought about Noma and how I should nourish him and so I dragged my body to the kitchen, grabbed the prescription migraine medicine, a piece of bread for me, and a banana for B. We swallowed those and went back to sleep. We woke up at around 10am feeling SO much better. Thank God. I went back out to the kitchen, cooked up some boiled chicken and rice for Ash, two iced coffees, made ghetto egg fried rice for Brian, and sent him off to work. 

The normalcy of that routine in our new home, of just taking care of my little family, amazingly brought me back to reality and a state of peacefulness. Not to mention, Ash seems to be doing so much better, so I'm trying to forget about her almost one thousand dollar visit to the vet, and convince myself all those dollars is what made her better and in return gave me peace of mind. Haha. 

I spent the rest of the morning and day-time slowly moving around and cleaning things up in the new house, and I must say, I am going to love living here with my family. Home is wherever they are, and I have to constantly remind myself of this fact. Often times, we get so overwhelmed with the trivial things in life, and also with trying to live a life that meets the standards of everybody around us. I am totally guilty of this, as I had been totally unsatisfied with my life, despite all the blessings God had been pouring out on us. 

We are not completely in the clear with Noma, as I am still waiting for the doctor to call back and follow up with me, but let me just say, he is all that matters to me from here on out. My cousin messaged me this morning and offered to bring her ginormous 34 wk preggo body over to me after work to bring us dinner, and then gently rebuked me for taking on too much in life and not taking better care of me and Noma. That is exactly what I needed to hear and so today, despite still being worried sick, I spent my time resting my body and thinking positive thoughts, and I feel much better. I don't know why I'm sharing such private things on my blog, but I just wanted to document this day. And kind of encourage everyone to take joy in the little things and what you have, and not focus on what you don't have. Please also pray for my baby. The good news is that his heart-rate was good, my fluids are good, and he is still kicking pretty regularly.  At this point all that matters is his health. I was not so secretly hoping that he would join us a little early at 38 wks so I could end this tortuous pregnancy (and because I am so eager to meet him), but at this point I will be happy with him being a Christmas baby, or even if he decides to join us in 2016, just so long as he is healthy and happy. Thanks for listening.  ❤️

alright,
so
a
few things.

1. i promised myself i would not wear stripes throughout my pregnancy, but literally that is all they sell!
blee says i look like a jailbird in this shirt ( hideous, i know) but it is the most comfortable maternity shirt i own.

2. my dad was feeling a little bored or silly last night i guess. he kakao messaged me at 11pm saying "DDAL! I think you and I weigh about the same now." my dad is 6 ft 1. he is lucky he lives in OC and i live in LA bc i swear i wanted to drive over and punch him in the face.

3. it was my birthday this past weekend and my crazy husband threw me a fancy birthday dinner with some of my best friends. despite the mild heart attack i had when he footed the entire bill, i had a lovely time and all in all i guess i appreciate the sweet gesture. i made a pretty big deal out of it when we got home and he told me the dinner was in place of an actual gift. uh, give me my gift yo! jk. i am pretty thankful for friends who always love on me so much. they were also sweet enough to tell me "o you're still so tiny!" and i spent that day believing it. until i went over to my cousin's house the very next day and her (intoxicated) husband told me i look like i'm about to BLOW! lol!!!!

4. i secretly hoped to stay under 150 until this kid came out, but i recently hit 150. and i still have like 14 weeks (noma, you can come out in 11 or 12 if you want.. don't feel pressured to fill up the 40) to go!!!! :( i honestly don't know how much other moms weigh during pregnancy as it seems to be a hush hush topic, so i am just hoping the majority of women weigh close to this much but just don't talk about it. haha

ok, so that was more than a few things. it's been so hot lately and i have been a pretty useless human being as my little homie has been chillin snug in my spine area and making it hard for me to walk around. i went for another ultrasound and we STILL couldn't get a look at his face because he was so low and hidden. but he seems to be healthy and that is all i can hope for. what a mom thing to say. til next time!

on tuesday night, as i was washing up for bed,
my husband looked at me and said

"you know after this whole pregnancy thing, i expect you to be 110 pounds, right?"

and so i stabbed him with a knife repeatedly until he finally stopped breathing and dropped dead.
















......just kidding.

i'm pretty sure he was just joking (he'll be so embarrassed and frightened of all womankind that i posted about it), and i couldn't care less if he wasn't.

i just responded

me: "HAHA. 110????? not even 120???"

blee: "YURI was 110"

you guys, he was talking about SUNG YURI from fin.k.l. fine killing liberty. lol. his dream girl from the late 90's.

anyway, i told him "YURI IS AN EFFING LIAR. SHE IS NOT 110 pounds. THAT'S HER STAGE WEIGHT."

guys are so out of touch with reality.
i am 5'7", and the last time i was 110 pounds was in 2010,  when i literally walked 5 miles a day and  had bones sticking out of my chest lol.

i acted like i was really hurt and offended by his words, and hopped in the shower. i think he was really worried that i took his comment seriously because he stood outside the shower stall with his hands behind his back and kept repeating over and over again "you know i really really love you a lot, right?" which is something that i've never heard him say in our 5 years together. lololol
but like i said. i couldn't care less about what he thinks. besides, he is not exactly hot sh*t either. haha.


so anyway. BRO, if you're reading this. LET ME WORK ON GETTING BACK TO AT LEAST 130,  FIRST. OKAY? geez.