Welcome Mason

Well, what seems to have been like....a 9 month hiatus, I'm finally posting! I couldn't in good conscience not post about our latest little friend. On October 21, 2010 we welcomed little Mason Allen Brown into the family! I was induced, as per typical Kari....and also as expected, labor was ridiculously fast.....AGAIN!! Thank heaven I was numb! My water broke on it's own at around 12:15 pm and then, just before he was born, I went from a 6cm dilation to a 10 in literally, 5 minutes! Talk about frightening! I'm so grateful for inductions! He was 8 lb. 4 oz. when he was born and 20 inches long! It's so fun to have another little guy in the house....and the brothers adore him!

So far, my recovery has honestly, pretty much stunk. I think I am literally falling apart! I'm not sure if it's that I'm in my 30's this time around, the fact that he's #4, or a combination of the two, but I've really struggled to feel "normal" again. Unfortunately, we suspect I had a "wet tap" from my epidural, which caused some incredible headaches! At the same time, I was running a fever and felt like I had the flu, as a side efffect from the Tdap shot they gave me when I was discharged from the hospital. If that wasn't enough, it took forever for my milk to come in on top of that, and since I don't breastfeed, that was incredibly painful and took longer than usual to dry up! I was hoping once that passed, I would be on the mend, just in time for Gavin to bring home a killer cold/cough from school which Michael and I both got. The good news, is that Mason made it unscathed! Two weeks later I am still coughing from it, and have since had to have a root canal done - I could feel my pulse in my teeth, it was that painful! And I've had ulcers from the chronic heartburn I had when I was carrying him. They've put me on ulcer meds and 3 different antibiotics to balance the bacteria in my system, because of the stomach pains I was having! Like I said....it's a laundry list of awful things I've struggled with since I had him. That said....it's true, he's worth it, but it sure has been a bummer to recover from!Our little guy is actually sleeping quite well! He goes down around 11 and usually gets up from 3:30 to 4:30, or so. The hardest part is dragging my bum out of bed at 7am when the others need to get rolling and the routine starts again! Any mother out there knows that the first few months are a struggle, and I really feel like I'm living that movie "Groundhog Day," but at least this time around, I know it'll get easier as we go. We still haven't gotten an official smile out of Mason and keep trying to get him to talk to us; he made a couple cooing noises the other day, but nothing since.

So, life is adjusting once again, and with it, Michael got a new job! He'll be starting the week after Thanksgiving, working for a company called Servicenow.com He had a friend working their who kept asking him to come work with him, and finally, Michael felt it was the right time. He will primarily be working from home! We'll see how this goes...it'll be a big change for all of us! Hopefully it's for the better! The only downside is that it will require travel at least once a month, but maybe it'll be great and we'll all be ready for a break when that rolls around. That's it in a nutshell. I'll try to post next time, sooner than 9 months from now!