Welcome to the world Leland

In case you haven’t heard the news, there is a new addition to the Palmer family. His name is Leland Justin Palmer and he was born on July 27 at 1:21 am. Leland weighed 8 pounds and 3 ounces and was 20 inches long. I was both happy and surprised that he came out weighing what he did for coming to this world a whole two weeks early. But he had absolutely no problems and is a super healthy little boy. Here is the quick version of his birth story:

On Friday July 26 I went in to my regular weekly doctor’s appointment. For the first time my whole pregnancy my blood pressure was high which meant that I had toxemia. My doctor had me go up to labor and delivery after my appointment to get a stress test done- which basically means that they monitor the babies heart rate and do a whole bunch of blood work on me. All of the labs came back great and Leland’s heart was perfect, but I did have a really bad headache that they were concerned about. I told them that I was hypoglycemic and that I might just be hungry. So they gave me a sandwich, crackers, and some Tylenol. If the headache went away in one hour than I was good to go home, if it didn’t they would most likely induce labor. Well as you can guess, the headache didn’t go away and so I was induced.

They put me on a magnesium IV to prevent seizures because of my toxemia that made me really sick. I threw up about eight times during labor, but other than that things were progressing really well and I was doing great. I was surprisingly tired and slept a ton while I was in labor. After the doctor broke my water my contractions got way worse and more frequent so it was time to order the epidural. The epidural doctor was a freaking idiot- worst bedside manners EVER- and he missed the first time hitting a blood vessel. Getting an epidural once is bad enough but having to do it twice is pure hell! Thank heavens for Justin- he is the only thing that kept me sane through that whole thing.

After the epidural was in I was feeling pretty happy about life. I couldn’t feel any of my contractions and went back to basically just sleeping and waking up every so often to vomit. Around 11:30 pm I was finally dilated to a 10 and at 12:30 I began pushing. So to sum things up I was in labor for about ten hours and only had to push for about 50 minutes. Everyone was kind of shocked that it went so fast for a first baby. I feel extremely lucky that it went so well!

July 26’th was my Grandma Paulsen’s birthday. I was kind of bummed that I didn’t have him on her birthday, but I honestly feel like that was a present from her. That entire day I just knew that she was in my corner cheering me on. I can’t even begin to describe how grateful I am for this precious little boy. He has turned our world upside down and I love him a little bit more every day. He is absolutely perfect. No really, he is! I know that he was a gift from God. The first time after his birth that Justin and I prayed together I made him say it because I knew there was no way I would be able to get through that prayer. As I listened to my husband thank our Heavenly Father for this amazing baby tears just poured down my cheeks. My heart is so full. Sometimes when I am feeding him in the middle of the night I sing primary songs to him. Last night I  was singing ‘A Child’s Prayer’ to him and when I got to the lines “You are his child. His love will surround you” I completely lost it and started bawling my eyes out. I literally could feel the love that Heavenly Father has for this little guy fill the room in that moment. I am completely grateful, and overwhelmed, that He would entrust him to me. I am just so, so blessed!!