Well, we were thrilled but also cautious. I knew that there was a chance I could have another premature birth. But you know.. I just let God take care of that. I told him it was in his hands and I would take whatever happened! I knew what to do if there were problems again - I was much more educated about pregnancy and gestational diabetes and all the things that could go wrong. In fact, I obsessed about these things so much before I got pregnant that I felt I had a mini-medical degree! 

As time went on, I did get put on bedrest just as a precaution. I had one instance of preterm labor - but that was mainly due to being dehydrated. As soon as I drank some water at the hospital, the contractions stopped. (I've never been too good at drinking my water!)

At my first appointment I asked them to go ahead and check me for gestational diabetes. Immediatley my blood sugar was in the 200s and I had breakfast a couple of hours before. I knew that things would be different this time. I was immediately put on the diabetic diet - low carbs and lots of veggies. Just what every pregnant woman wants to hear - no ice cream! But I did my best to maintain the diet. I eventually added insulin shots to regulate my blood sugar. I NEVER thought I could give myself a shot, but it is amazing what you can do for the health and safety of your baby. I actually didn't mind the shots after a while. I don't know that I was PERFECT at maintaining good blood sugars but I did try hard! 

When I had my ultrasounds, they always said MacKenzie was going to be a big baby. As we got closer to my due date (mid May), I was told she would be over 10lbs! I was NOT about to have a 10+lb baby vaginally and risk a brain injury due to being STUCK so I asked my doctor to do a c-section. I didn't relish the thought of being cut open -- but I was willing to do that rather than face the risk of another birth injury for my baby.

After an amniocentisis showed the baby's lungs were mature at 38 weeks, the doctor scheduled the c-section for May 1, 1998. Jasie MacKenzie was born at 9:05 in the morning and weighed 9lbs 12.2oz. She was a BIG girl. Daniel was there with me and got some wonderful pictures of MacKenzie being born. I will scan those as soon as possible - they're in her scrapbook but I can't find my online copies.

Having a full term baby was actually very painful emotionally -- something I didn't expect. For years we had wondered what it would be like to have a baby and take it home in 2-3 days! What a joy that would be. People who did that every day just took it for granted - maybe we had a chip on our proverbial shoulders -- but Daniel and I had a hard time everytime someone we knew had a full-term healthy baby. It was so far from reality for us -- until MacKenzie came along.

Then when I brought MacKenzie home, Josh looked SO BIG. He was 4 years old and the reality that he wasn't my baby anymore was really difficult. Plus I ached for him to have the same abilities as his sister would have. Was it going to be hard to watch them grow up side by side but differently? I didn't know... but having MacKenzie also healed my heart in many ways. I no longer looked at other people's babies and wondered what it would be like -- I knew.