Cooper Patrick

My goodness, how time flies. I had every intention of writing a post about the newest addition to our family earlier. But then I became a mom, and here I am 5 weeks later writing. Whether anyone reads this or not, it's a way for me to write down and remember the story of how Cooper came into our lives on January 29, at 4:51am weighing in at 6 lbs 12 oz. 

Let's start in California, where our little man was created. Yes it's true. Cooper was conceived in San Francisco little to our knowledge sometime in May 2016. Early June, Brian and I hit the road and moved back to Chicago with the little nugget growing in my belly. About 4 days into living in Chicago we found out that we were pregnant. Crazy, right? It couldn't have worked out any better though. We are close to Ohio, which means close to parents, but more importantly, we have a huge network of friends in Chicago, most of whom also have little babies. 

Then there was pregnant Katie. I was a very lucky lady for those 9 months. No morning sickness, no major complications for baby or mom. That meant I was able to keep working out up until the day Cooper was born. I'm a big Kayla Itsines (Bikini Body Guide) follower and I was able to do modified BBG workouts all the way through. I've been doing the BBG workouts for about 2 years now, so continuing it through my pregnancy wasn't something new for my body. All those squats and pushups kept me super strong and healthy. It's probably not for everyone, but my doctor didn't object since it wasn't hurting me or the baby. 

While I was pregnant we had some pretty epic events happen. My sister, Brian's sister, California friends, Chicago friends and friends in Charleston got married. Can you imagine going to that many weddings sober? Ya, me neither. I also had a trip to Dublin, we took a trip to Hawaii and spent Christmas in Ohio. So many fun things we can tell baby boy about someday.

Sometime in early January, when I was about a month away, I started getting weekly checkups because I had a single artery umbilical cord. Nothing serious, but warranted weekly testing at the hospital to keep tabs on Mom and baby. Well, I am apparently a Braxton Hicks machine. You guys. For a month straight I had contractions. They didn't hurt, but what the hell? All these fake contractions, and me being 4-5cm dilated for 2 weeks (!!), led to a few false alarms. We got sent to triage a couple times by doctors, and once because I had no idea what I was doing. 

Fourth time is the charm I suppose. I had good reason to head in the last time, and when the doctors told us that Cooper's heartbeat was dropping with my (still false) contractions, it was time to head to labor and delivery. Because my contractions were still not regular, they induced me. About 10 seconds after the pitocin hit my bloodstream I had a contraction that stopped me in my tracks. I thought I was going to die. Bring on the epidural. At about 11pm they gave me my epidural and told us to get comfortable. The baby should be there by noon the next day. 

They were wrong. A doctor came in to check on me at 4am (the nurse was of course checking on me all the time). What the nurse didn't realize, and neither did I because I couldn't feel anything, was that my water broke. And the baby's head was coming out. The doctor said she could see his hair (hair?? my baby isn't bald!) and that it was time to push. So at 4:20am I started pushing; Brian holding my numb, useless legs up. After about 10 rounds of pushing, baby Cooper popped out at 4:51am. He was perfect and we loved his sweet face so much. All things considered, it was an "easy" delivery with no complications.

Fast forward 5 weeks, and we're parenting pros. Ha! Just kidding. Five weeks down the road and we have a healthy baby that sleeps and eats like a champ. He's probably around 8 1/2 lbs now, lost most of his hair and has tons of friends. I'm on maternity leave until June, so we have lots of adventures ahead! Now we're looking forward to smiles and laughs, and the first night Cooper sleeps through the night.