Birth - 3 Months

Well,

Everyone told me that raising a child would be hard, but I never realized just how hard that was going to be. I never ever once thought that having to wake up at 2, 3and 5 A.M. to feed and change a baby would be hard, but it’s a complete nightmare, but now that he’s a little bit older, its only once a night. Don’t get me wrong, I love my son more than anything in this world, but protection is something that definitely would’ve been in play if I would have known what I do now.  And I thought the labor and delivery was rough…

Something that they don’t tell you is that babies constantly cry when they are getting their teeth, and they’ll drive you up the wall. Oh, and there’s the cry where they just want attention, especially when you’re trying to do laundry or something like that.. That’s a joyJ

I’m not trying to sound like I hate motherhood, because I don’t I love it. I’m trying to get the rest of the teenage population to see that yeah, sex is all fun and games, but it creates another human being. It creates a little person who depends only on you. It’s a baby who YOU are responsible for and all of your actions affect. It’s not something that I would wish on my most hated enemy because I know just how hard it is and how much it slows down on you accomplishing your goals, dreams, wants and even sometimes your needs.

Maybe some people can’t have it as lucky as me and have your baby’s daddy there supporting the baby, or even be married to him. But, here are some statistics that I researched so help widen your eyes.

 About half of all marriages when the teen is under 18 at the time of marriage end up in separation or divorce within 10 years. That is double the rate of marriages for adults over age 25.

The majority of all teen pregnancies occur among the older teens.  According to the Guttmacher Institute ,U.S. Teenage Pregnancy statistics, two thirds of all teen pregnancies occur among 18 and 19 year olds.  This accounts for approximately 73 per 1,000 girls.  While about half of all pregnancies are unplanned, this age group is responsible for the highest rate of unintended pregnancy.
The current birth rate for girls aged 15-17 is approximately 22 per 1,000.  However, from 1991-2007, birth rates for this age group showed a steady decline of more than 40%.  In addition, birth rates for girls ages 10-14 also decreased between 1991-2007.  It is estimated that they are down by more than 55%.  Presently, there are approximately 0.6 births for every 1,000 ten to fourteen year old girls.  However, in recent years, this number appears to be staying fairly consistent, while other age groups continue to decline.
It is estimated that 85% of all teenage pregnancies are unplanned.  More than half of the teens who get pregnant report using some type of contraceptive.  However, an estimated 90% of teen pregnancy may be the result of inconsistent use of contraceptives or failure to use them properly.  Many other factors are thought to contribute to teenage pregnancy, including family structure, pressure from peers, and the community environment of the youth.
Although numerous efforts have been made to educate our youth about abstinence, safe sex, and birth control, teen mothers continue to give birth.  In many cases, this results as a disadvantage to the teen mother, her baby, and society.  Teen mothers are unlikely to finish high school and often fall into a lower socioeconomic status.  As a result, an estimated 80% of them end up on welfare.  Newborns of teen mothers often lack proper pre-natal care, have lower birth weights, struggle to perform well in school, or have a greater chance of being neglected and abused.  In addition, a child born of a teen mother is more likely to become a teen mother themselves.
(Courtesy of www.pregnantteenhelp.org)

Labor and Delievery

  This one is rough..

  So, on February 8, 2011 I run around all day long with my nerves on end and the only thing that I can do is clean. And clean. And clean some more. Tyler's at work, my moms at work, and my mamaw is doing nothing but making me more nervous.
   At 12 o'clock that night I'm standing outside the doors of the woman's pavilion just wanting to be at home in my own bed with my head covered pretending like I'm 7 again. By 12:30 on February 9, 2011 they have me hooked up to a IV and have given me a vaginal tablet that is supposed to help my utern walls soften and they put me on a pitocin drip that makes me dilate. They also put 2 monitors around my stomach, one to track my contractions, and the other to track the baby's heart beat.  By 4 o' clock that morning I start to feel a slight grabbing in my lower back and the nurse says that is the beginning of my contractions. Oh joy.
  As time goes by the contractions get a little bit stronger, but nothing that I couldn't shrug off my shoulder.  At 7 o' clock the doctor comes in there and said that I was 3 cm dilated and that he was going to break my water. Let me tell you, that isn't the clear liquid stuff called water that is in almost everything that we consume. It was mostly blood, and I leaked that stuff forever.
  But anyways, after he broke my water, they took those 2 monitors off from around my tummy and put another type of monitor on the baby's head with like a suction cup thing and some how put another up in me to track my contractions.
  By about 9:30 or 10 is when I can really feel my contractions and they offer me my epidural, but I'm going to be the macho man and refuse it until I asked for it. I wanted to feel what contractions were really about and if the movies were right. (All that was going on till about 2 was them checking my blood pressure and temperature.) And oh my, they are close to showing how it feels. By 1:30 p.m. my contractions were so bad that I couldn't take it anymore and told the nurses to run that epidural into my room. By the time that they got everything set up and started, it felt like my contractions we're hitting back to back, and they hurt so bad that I sat there and cried. After 10 minutes, I couldn't feel a thing from my titties to my toes.
  At 5:10 that evening, the doctor came in there to check me and I was at 5 cm but I had spiked a fever. He told me that if the fever didn't break and if I didn't dilate anymore that He was going to have to take me back for a emergency c-section. Exactly what I didn't want. Nothing was breaking this fever that I had and the pitocin wasn't working anymore, so when he came back in there at 6:10 and checked me again, he said to get ready you'll be back there within 5 minutes. That gave Tyler just enough time to put his doctor suit on and they was rolling me back to surgery.
  Now, this is where it gets really fuzzy. They pumped me full of things and was prepping me. Keep in mind that I have never been hospitalized, never had a surgery, never had a IV in me, nothing. I'm majorly freaking out about this whole thing and next thing I know the doc says that I'm going to feeling some pulling, by God I felt that, and it was making me sick to my stomach so I puked everywhere and 5 min after that Kaidyn Lane Dalton was here at 6:47 p.m.  And had to go to baby ICU for low respiration and a low fever caused by mine. 
  After they stitched me and stapled me I had to go into recovery for 2 hours and still didn't remember seeing my baby. At this point I was pretty ill and the nurses said that they had to crib him (get him used to the temp outside the incubator ). By this time it's about 10 p.m and they still haven't brought up my child and I'm calling the neonatal and my nurse every 5 minutes until I asked if I could come down to see my son. I was told if my nurse would let me, so I call her and she said that, ''Well if you think you can get out of bed.'' Sure can get the damn wheelchair in here. 4 1/2 hours after having a major surgery I got outta my bed and walked to my wheel chair to see my baby. 
  And he was so little! 6 lbs and 19 1/2 inches long, and he was absolutely perfect.