I am starting this blog a little late so let me catch you up...
When we were 20 weeks pregnant we had the normal 20 week ultra sound to check for growth and development. The doctor asked me if I was seeing what he was seeing at my baby's mouth, there was a shadow or void at his mouth. He told us that when he sees that on the ultra sound it usually means that the baby has a cleft lip and/or palate. I was devastated that I had done something to hurt my baby. We set up an appointment and ultra sound with a maternal fetal specialist for a few days later. During the few days until that appointment I was so worried and up set that something went wrong. I googled and researched everything I could find about clefts and of course I found the worst situations of everything. Well the day finally came when we went to the specialist, and he confirmed what my OB had told us a few days before that our baby had a cleft lip, he told us that there was no way for us to tell if he had a cleft palate until he was born, he seemed to think that he had a mild cleft lip and probably no cleft palate but he could not be for sure.
(I just want to put how much I love my sweet sweet boy and how perfect I think he is. And that God knows exactly what he is doing and when he made sweet boy he made him especially for me and he knew exactly what we needed. Landon needed me and I needed him.)
After the doctor confirmed that he had a cleft lip I just cried and cried and cried. I was so mad that this had happened to him. I didn't understand why. I had taken care of myself, I took my vitamins, I didn't drink, smoke or do drugs. After a few days of this my mom told me something that made me feel a whole lot better. She told me that the reason God had given me this special special baby was because he knew that I would be able to take care of him, and that if he would have given him to another person they would not be able to take care of this special boy. That made me feel better, for the time. I did more research, I looked at pictures and tried to imagine what my baby was going to look like.
The doctor had given us a number to a cleft clinic, so we made an appointment with them. I thought we were going to have to travel to Dallas to have surgery because I didn't know of a doctor here in Lubbock that did cleft lip and palate repairs. Well when we went to the clinic they told me about a great doctor right here in the LBK that did these surgeries. I was so excited to find out there was a doctor here but I wanted to make sure that he was going to be great! So I started asking around about him and every body had amazing things to say about him.
We went back to the specialist at 34 weeks to check on his lip again. Well, everything pretty much looked the same. The doctor had a hard time finding his cleft lip at first but we did find it and he said that it was very mild and he still thought that he did not have a cleft palate.
At this point I was just so excited about my little man fixing to be here I didn't care about anything else. We had a couple more ultrasounds with the regular OB doctor. Where he told us that he had only seen a cleft lip come out being a notch in the lip once, and that his most likely when all the up through his nose. I was very ok with this I had decided that I was very happy with a cleft lip and/or palate because we could have had a problem that was not fixable, and this cleft lip/palate was pretty much a cosmetic problem and there were lots of things to help him eat and we would get it fixed no big deal.
Finally after 39 LONG weeks the big day was finally here!!!! March 26, 2012 at 9:04 pm Landon Lynne Grace was born!!! And I have never in my whole life been as happy as was that day! My little man was here!!!!
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| Landon with his mommy and daddy for the first time! |
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| 7 pounds 4 ounces |
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| My sweet baby boy! |
I cannot explain the joy and excitement that I felt when I finally got to see and hold my little man. I honestly didn't even think about his cleft lip/palate when he was born, until the doctor told us that his palate was intact!!!!!! OMG what a blessing!! And his cleft lip was an incomplete cleft lip and it was so little!!!!! And he was beautiful!!!!!!!! The whole time I was pregnant I was worried about him being able to eat. I didn't care one way or another if he was going to breastfeed or bottle or special bottle or formula or pumping, I just wanted him to be healthy. Well when the nurses were cleaning him up in the warmer I looked over at him and he was sucking, just laying there trying to suck on something. And he was able to breastfeed which we thought it was a miracle in itself and he ate good!!!
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| Brandon giving Landon his first bath! |
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| 1 Day Old |
Our surgeon who is a plastic surgeon and an ear, nose and throat doctor (perfect for our situation) came to see us! He confirmed that Landon's palate was intact and that he had an incomplete cleft lip.
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| Dr. Demke checking Landon out |
After Dr. Demke checked Landon out we made plans to visit him in the office and check things out again and prepare for surgery to repair his cleft lip at 10-12 weeks. In those weeks it is amazing how much I fell in love with my little man and his cleft lip. Landon grew and developed amazingly! And I became a true mamarazzi!
