Introducing Maximus Renzo Kehs

I'm a mom of all boys!  I'm so glad that with each pregnancy we didn't find out the gender of our baby.  It makes for such a fun moment on delivery day.  Having my three little guys around the house is just as it should be.  (Theo is quick to tell everyone we have four boys and one guuurl in the house...although he's asked a few times when a baby sister is coming...sorry kiddo!)

Maximus was born on Friday, October 21st at 8:17am and measured in at 8lbs 9oz (our lightest baby) and 21 inches long.  He has blue eyes and a full head of thick hair.  When Mason first held him up to me my first instinct was that he looked just like Woodrow, which was funny since I remember thinking Woodrow looked just like Theo at birth.  Once I got some closer looks I started to think that Max really resembled Theo, but of course he has his own little face!  Max definitely was testing those little lungs of his after the delivery, but he quieted down once Mason held him and once I got to lay him on my chest.

It wasn't a huge secret that I was hoping to avoid a third c-section this time around, but after trying to encourage baby to come on his own (trying some tricks to induce labor) he did not come by the doctors deadline and so I had been scheduled for a repeat c-section on October 21st.  We are so thankful to everyone who helped us out with the big boys on and around delivery day.  It was really stressful to plan out their care because in the past my mom was able to come help us and Mason could stay with me at the hospital.  Here, we had to make it work.  I am so grateful that Mason was able to be with me, which I don't take lightly because I have friends having babies with their husband's deployed, so I'm thankful for Mason because I honestly don't think that I could do this without him.

Our friend Hannah came to our house at 5am on the 21st and stayed at our house with the boys until they woke up and then she treated them to doughnuts and picking out a present for Max before taking them back to her house for the entire day.  The boys had a blast and they had a really fun time playing with their friends Colt and Reid.  Mason picked them up that evening and took them home and then on Saturday morning the kids got to come meet Max and our friend Sam watched the boys Saturday afternoon.  It was hard to not have Mason at the hospital in the evenings/overnight, but we survived.

The morning of the 21st Mason and I left the house shortly after 5am and headed the 45 minutes to the Naval Hospital in Guam,which is about 1/3 of the way down the island.  The hospital is a really nice facility and we had an ocean view from our window.   For all of Friday and Saturday we were the only people on the L&D floor so we got great attention!  Sunday is when the bus loads of pregnant ladies started showing up.  Once we got to the hospital I got changed and was hooked up to the fetal monitors and the leg pressure-things (very technical terms here) and had the normal checks done (temp., pulse, BP).  The nurses drew blood and set-up two IVs.  Since I had previous c-sections there was much more talk this time about "contingency plans" on the what-ifs if something were to go south during surgery.  It took them a LONG time and 3 nurses to get the IVs placed.  Luckily I only ended up with one huge bruise.  The anesthesiologist came in and spent awhile talking with us and reviewing the notes that were taken from the anesthesiologist I chatted with at my NST the week prior.  Other nurses talked to Mason about what was in my Advanced Directive etc...Mason got to change into scrubs and we got ready to go to the operating room.

Mason had to stay behind in the recovery room while I went down to the OR with the doctors.  They got the epidural placed.  They used a combo spinal and epidural since the surgery was expected to take a little longer than my last c-section and they didn't want it wearing off.  I had a lovely catheter placed and got into position with all the drapes etc...I was not feeling feel from the epidural but I was clear that I wanted to be awake the whole time, so I was given a little medicine to take off the nauseous edge.  The procedure started and Mason was eventually brought in.  The nurses and anesthesiologist got a chuckle from the fact that I was crying like I told them I would as a side effect from the meds. They kind of laughed when I said that was a side-effect that I have, but they laughed when they saw it actually happen.

Once Mason was in the room, I felt a lot better.  Despite the tears running down my face, he was right there where I needed him to be.  He talked to me as the doctors did their work and before long they told us that the baby was about to be born.  We had a lot of nurses rooting for a girl and in the last few weeks we were thinking I might be having a girl, so it was a fun surprise when Mason said, "it's another boy!"  The doctor (Lt. Kutcher) held Maximus up who was (Baby Boy Kehs for until almost 4pm that day) held him up so I could get a look at the little wrinkly mess before he was taken to get his Apgar tests done (all perfect).  Mason went right over to get some pictures and check out his son who was wailing.  They cleaned Max up a little bit and then let me have  a "gentle c-section" which meant that they put Max on my chest while they continued to finish the procedure.  I didn't have this immediate experience with Theo or Woodrow, so it was really nice to be able to soothe little Max and see him right away.  After awhile they took Max to go get him taken care of and Mason went off with him during the last minutes of the c-section and then I got taken back to my room.  By the time I got there Max and Mason were coming into the room.

Friday was pretty rough.  The Naval hospital was really great about giving us our space, Max stayed in the room the entire time I was in the hospital, and they were good about being quiet when they came in and out for checks.  My pre-surgery lab work came back that I had developed pre-ecclampsia which explained my high blood pressures on delivery day and so I had lots of extra monitoring during the day on Friday.  I also spent most of the day throwing-up.  Any ice/water/broth I had came up and that was not fun, and unfortunately Mason was looking green by the end of the day too.  I was finally able to keep some saltines and peanut butter crackers down.  I had to do some breathing treatments, and have more blood drawn and extra blood pressure checks.  Max took to nursing pretty well and I naively thought I wouldn't feel any pain this time around (hahaha...that came soon enough).

The hospital stay went well.  It was hard, and the first two weeks post-baby were really hard and I had lots of times where I just had that feeling/reminder that this will be our last planned baby.  When I finally got a shower it felt amazing.  Max and I got to bond as we stayed awake a lot in the evening time, I slept a lot during the day which was nice when Mason was there.

The name...it took a long time to narrow down.  We really didn't have any names that we loved.  I thought that I had a boy name that I was sure of, but Mason wasn't diggin' it.  We had our girl names pretty well chosen, but not much for a boy.  We think Maximus is a perfect fit for our little guy. I wanted a middle name that started with an "R" especially if we had a girl, since the women on my side are Rita (mom), Regina and Ruth (grandmothers) and so when we had a boy I wanted to keep the "R". We didn't have  a lot of "R" family names so we chose Renzo because it means third son in Japanese. 

Max was discharged on Sunday, but got to stay as my roommate since I wasn't discharged until Monday morning.  It was definitely a surreal feeling loading up the car on Monday morning with three kids in the backseat.  I know all the moments won't be perfect, but for now, this family of five feels pretty amazing and I thank God for the blessings of these babies and husband of mine.