For my whole life, I have wanted to be a mom. It was just always something I knew I wanted. I married my husband, Ryan, in September of 2013. We enjoy spending time with each other, and this year will celebrate 14 years together as a couple. Being married is wonderful, and we wanted to add to that happiness by having a child.  After we celebrated our fourth wedding anniversary, we decided the time was right to start our family. The very next month, in October of 2017 we started trying.

I was very lucky to get pregnant on the first try and it was hard to imagine that there was life growing inside me. I found out I was pregnant right before Halloween of 2017.

We went to my Obstetrician’s office and got to hear our baby’s heartbeat and see him on the ultrasound. It was so cool to hear his tiny little heartbeat for the first time. The OB told me that my due date was early July 2018.

I didn’t do any genetic testing before I became pregnant.  My husband and I decided it was better not to know. It would just cause unnecessary worry and it wouldn’t change anything about our decision to have a baby. We did do one prenatal screening called the Harmony test. It tests for Down Syndrome and a few other genetic anomalies, through a blood test when a woman is 10-weeks pregnant. It can also tell the gender of the baby, which is pretty accurate. Over the winter holidays, we got the results back from the Harmony test I took.

Everything was normal and we were having a BOY! I will always remember the moment we found out our baby was a boy. We were standing in the kitchen, listening to a voicemail from the nurse from my OB’s office with the test results. As soon as we found out, we were jumping up and down hugging and crying. They were happy tears.

Many people refer to baby boys as “little man.” I don’t particularly care for this expression, so when talking to my son in my belly I decided to call him “Little Boy.” This would go on to be his nickname because his name was a surprise to everyone. At my baby shower, my mom made a banner that said “Little Boy” and it is now hanging in his nursery. My husband and I thought of his name months before he was even conceived on the way back from a road trip. We decided to keep his name to ourselves. The only hint we gave anyone was that he was named after a family member who had passed.

I experienced some complications with my pregnancy including nausea the entire time, bad swelling, prenatal hypertension and later preeclampsia.  According to the Mayo Clinic, “Preeclampsia is a pregnancy complication characterized by high blood pressure and signs of damage to another organ system, most often the liver and kidneys. Preeclampsia usually begins after 20 weeks of pregnancy in women whose blood pressure had been normal.”

During one of my OB appointments, my doctor sent me to the hospital because of my high blood pressure at 34-weeks pregnant. That was the first time I had seen this doctor, since my OB practice has many doctors and whoever is on call that day is the doctor that delivers your baby. I stayed overnight at Northside Hospital-Atlanta. At that time, it was estimated I would deliver at 36 or 37-weeks pregnant due to all the complications I was experiencing.

At 35-weeks pregnant, during my OB appointment, the doctor sent me back to the hospital due to a very high blood pressure and a headache that wouldn’t go away. This is a common sign of preeclampsia and was very worrisome to my doctor. While I was resting before going to the appointment, my husband had a feeling we were having the baby. He gathered up and packed our bags for the hospital.

We arrived at Northside and were taken to a room in C-section waiting since the baby was still breech. I asked my husband what the date was. He said, “June Fourth.” I decided that was a good day to have a baby. We still didn’t know what was going on and when I would deliver our son. We filled out paperwork and I saw the on-call doctor, who happened to the same one who sent me to the hospital earlier. He said that it would be best to do the C-section that night. By that time it was about 5 o’clock in the evening. The operating room was booked for 8:30 p.m. based on my last meal. We literally found out three hours before our son was born that we were for sure having him that day. It was suspected that I had preeclampsia and the doctor wanted to deliver him then because that condition has a tendency to escalate very quickly. It can be very harmful to the mother and the baby.

I was prepped for surgery and taken to the OR, where I had my C-section.  Only one support person is allowed in the OR, so my husband went with me.

The procedure went well, with no complications. Since I was only 35-weeks, there was a team from the NICU in the operating room just in case. They turned out not to be needed. The nurses wiped down our son and he was placed on my chest. I will always remember this special moment. In fact, it is making me teary-eyed as I write this. I said to my son, “Hi Nathan, I’m your Mommy.” It felt so good to see my son. The first thing I noticed was how little and cute he was. He was staring right at me and was very calm, all bundled up in his swaddle blanket. All this time, my husband was snapping pictures with his phone of our son and the anesthesiologist took the classic C-Section family photo with the sheet in the background and us in our surgical gear.

My husband left the room and followed the nurses with Nathan to weigh him in the nursery. I was then sent to recovery. My husband remembers one of the nurses saying, “I don’t think he’s going to make weight, he’s really light.” The NICU nurses said, “What are you talking about? He looks big.” She then said, “You’re used to all the really little babies.” Turns out he didn’t make weight and had to go to the transition nursery to be evaluated. Nathan John Basler was born at 9:22 p.m. on June 4,2018, weighing 4 lbs. 6 oz. and 17 inches long. He was five weeks early and considered premature. Aside from some temperature issues and a little jaundice, Nathan was perfectly healthy and was then brought into our hospital room shortly after I came back from recovery.

During our five-day stay in the hospital for Nathan’s birth, he was not eating as much as he should. The doctors at Kennesaw Pediatrics, our pediatrician practice, saw Nathan every single day he was in the nursery. Our pediatrician recommended that Nathan see a feeding therapist and hoped that he wouldn’t have to go to the NICU for poor feeding.

We saw the feeding therapist in our hospital room and she gave us some good pointers on helping him eat better. Premature babies aren’t always the best at feeding since that is one of the last skills babies develop in the womb. I had Nathan on a Monday, and Friday evening he was admitted to the NICU for poor feeding. We were thankful we had those full four days with our son in our hospital room and that he was a healthy baby boy, just needed to learn how to eat properly.

Having a child in the NICU is very hard, especially when you have to go home but your baby does not. It was a very trying time for our family. I cried at some point every single day. I just wanted our baby home. We visited him every day.  My husband would wake up at 4 a.m. to go before work and I would go in the afternoon and stay until long after my husband got off work and came back to the NICU to be with Nathan. Everyone at the Northside Hospital NICU was wonderful. The doctors, nurses and staff were all great to work with and very caring towards our son. Northside is a tier three NICU, so it is one of the best there is. If our son couldn’t come home with us, we were glad he was being taken care of at Northside versus another hospital. 

We were released from the NICU after 13 long days. We found out that we were going home about three hours before we did. We knew it was a possibility but didn’t think it would happen right then. Sound familiar?

We finally got to take our little boy home! The first night was exhausting. The next day, we called my parents to come over and help a little because we were so sleep deprived. Feeding him every three hours will wear you out! My husband stayed home from work for a week after he came home to be there and help care for our son.

Time went on and we got used to having him home. We took newborn photos the first week he was home, at three weeks old. On Thursday, June 28 our son had his brit milah or bris.  A bris is a Jewish tradition dating back thousands of years where a baby boy is circumcised and receives his Hebrew name. Before I talk about Nathan’s Hebrew name, I’ll talk about his English name. He is named after Nathan Zlotnik, my dad’s father, who is a Holocaust survivor, and passed away at the age of 90 when I was 10 years old. His middle name, John, is named after my husband’s Great Uncle Johnny. He was like a second grandfather to my husband, especially after his own grandfather passed. They would spend his childhood summers at Uncle Johnny’s lake house in Tennessee on the water. I got to know Uncle Johnny over the years and had the pleasure of visiting the lake house too. About three years ago, Uncle Johnny passed away at the age of 90. We decided to name our son after these family members who meant so much to us, but also had other family members we wanted to honor that also were dear to our hearts.

This is where Nathan’s Hebrew name comes from. He was named Nissim Allon. Nissim is after my grandfather Nelson Zavack, who is my mom’s father. He passed away when I was about two years old, and I don’t really remember him. He meant a lot to our family. Nissim means miracle and our boy is such a little miracle.

He is also named Allon, after my husband’s grandfather on his mother’s side, Allen Morrell. He passed away before my husband was born. My in-laws named my husband after Allen Morrell and we decided to carry on that tradition. Allon means oak tree and they are strong with deep roots. We really think that describes our son perfectly. He is so strong for just a tiny little guy and has so many family members who love him.

The bris was a wonderful ceremony. It was very hard to watch my son be circumcised, but I got through it. The bris was very meaningful. I like to think that I am bringing Jewish tradition back to my family because I wanted to have the ceremony and plan to raise my son with Jewish teachings.

At his 2-month appointment, Nathan measured 9 pounds 11 ounces and his weight more than doubled since birth. He is eating well and thriving. I’m so grateful my son and I are healthy after the journey we had. I sure love being his mom.

Author’s Note: I wrote this story about my son back in August, 2018. Nathan is now 9-months-old and weighs 18 pounds! We’re planning his first birthday party for June and I can’t believe my baby is getting so big!

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