Couple Things with Shawn and Andrew - 199 | third baby birth story

Episode Date: January 17, 2024

The birth story of our third baby, Bear :) The past month has been a dream soaking all of this in but we can't wait to share more. Head to our Youtube channel to watch our vlogs of bringing him home and showing the nursery! Thank you all for being a part of our journey. This episode is sponsored by AG1 ▶ Go to http://drinkAG1.com/couplethings. Check it out! This episode is also sponsored by Modern Fertility ▶Right now, Modern Fertility is offering our listeners $20 off the test when you go to http://ModernFertility.com/eastfam. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

When you're with Amex Platinum, you get access to exclusive dining experiences and an annual travel credit. So the best tapas in town might be in a new town altogether. That's the powerful backing of Amex. Terms and conditions apply. Learn more at Amex.ca. what's up everybody welcome back to couple things with Sean and Andrew and bear and little baby bear this is a podcast all about couples and the things they go through including childbirth and newborn

baby phase and all the chaos that comes with it we have had a wonderful maternity leave we're still technically on it for a long time yeah we still have a long time we're three and a half three and a half weeks out of the baby's birth. Yes. And it's been magic so far. It has. But we thought we would sneak into the studio to share the whole story with you, I guess, start to finish before we forget anything. And just kind of reminisce.

We love doing these baby birth story podcasts. The first one we had with Drew was probably the most eventful because we were going for like the natural birth. natural delivery and it turned out to be quite different and since then it's been a little smoother but

a little smoother some interesting hiccups so to recap Drew's Drew was 41 weeks and four days I think she ended up going in or we ended up going in for an induction

I went 17 hours without an epidural and we went through every possible interesting technique tool some of which are just things to get her out

and it wasn't working if you've never heard of a foley bulb do not look it up and do not find out what it is pleased by experience I have PTSD from that that's crazy uh 17 hours I tapped out and I got an epidural this is all with Drew by the way our first ended up going another 10 hours

um started affecting Drew's heart rate too much that we ended up needing to go in for a C-section. It wasn't an emergency. It wasn't like rushed by any means, but it was kind of like she was stuck in my pelvis. She hadn't dropped at all. And it was just kind of like, she's in distress. Let's, it's time to talk about a C-section. So we went in, C-section went smooth, Drew came out, purple as ever, wasn't quite crying immediately, which was a little scary.

Yeah, that's a, that's a highly anticipatory. Yeah. But ended up being amazing. Jet, fast forward. He measured quite a bit bigger than Drew because Drew got stuck on my pelvis. They were like,

we talked through a lot of options, VVACs and everything, and ultimately decided on a C-section for risks. Scheduled C-section. Scheduled C-section. We went in with him at 39. in a 39 weeks.

His C-section was very smooth. I do remember feeling quite high during his C-section. Yeah, you were out of it. I didn't like that. I was very out of it. I also, I have very low blood pressure. And so I get really nauseous with epidurals

or with spinal blocks and like anesthesia and stuff. And so for seven hours after Jett was born, I was puking my guts out, which was really unfortunate post-Csection. That was tough. We didn't have any of our parents come in the room to meet the baby because it was just total carnage in there. It was also COVID, which is wild situation.

I don't miss that at all, dude. Yeah, geez. No. So fast forward to Barrett, who goes by Bear, Madison East. So we didn't know the gender of this third baby. Just like we didn't know the gender of our first baby. We did find out with Jet our second. But I was 100% convinced it's a girl.

Which is so funny. And do you want to tell them? why? Why did I think? Oh, oh, yeah. Okay, so for those of you that don't know or don't follow us on YouTube, please go check that out, by the way. And if you haven't, please subscribe to this channel and give it a rating on whatever

platform you're listening to. It's just like, let's call it the old gentleman's agreement, you know. We're sharing our life and you could share a little love on the subscribe. But we did a surprise nursery design. So we had a designer come in and decorate a nursery. Lori Paranjapay. She was the only one that got the gender results after we got them. At 10 weeks, I got the gender results through genetic testing,

and I literally just forwarded them to her email. So she knew the gender. We didn't. We had the upstairs room where the nursery is locked, hadn't been in there for months. But there was one time I was up there. It was like the week before we went in. One time I was up there, and I heard the doctor.

door open so my natural inclination is like look at the door yeah who's there and i see just a sliver of the wall and it looked like light pink wallpaper with flowers when you see it you'll understand you'll understand why so i was like oh i got the inside scoop i also was thinking about the name we had for a baby girl and i was like i would love a girl so not only did i think i had a sneak peek into the which is funny i was more excited about the boy name funny i liked both of them yeah but uh So I thought it was a girl because of that. And I don't know. I just kind of had imagined our family with two girls and Jett

because of Jett's absolute masculinity that he brings to the family. And I will say I, for some reason, probably up until halfway through the pregnancy, thought it was a girl because of like symptoms, everything. And then I pulled up pictures towards the end of this pregnancy. of each pregnancy at the same exact week, so like 35 weeks. And my belly looked so much like Jet.

It's like something switched to me, and I was like, it's a boy. I think it's a boy. So, didn't know the gender walking in. We had the scheduled C section. I really wanted the date to be December 9th because that's my dad's birthday, and he passed away last December.

It would have been special. It doesn't actually matter. 1212 is a dope birthday. It's still special. It was a Tuesday, correct? Yeah. The weekend before, which I talked about, was really special. Magical.

Again, to Sean's credit with the paternity leave, she has scheduled all this content. We worked our tail off the last couple months, filming podcasts and interviews and all these things so that we could continue sharing with you all and connecting because we love that. But I feel like starting a week or two before the birth, we were kind of on break. We were. And so we were doing a bunch of fun family activities. including taking Drew climbing for the first time. Which I had to go on a tangent about because we went to Climb Nashville,

which is like a rock climbing place. They have all these harnesses for like every size of kid, every age, and they have auto-ballet climbing. So like you basically put a kid in a harness and... They go until their time. Yeah. It's great. And Drew is definitely a little bit more timid.

She's a little bit more like hesitant to try new things, but yet she's a beast when she does it. Honestly, it reminds me of you. when we first started dating, extremely capable and able. But, like, nervous to jump in. Yeah. So I wasn't sure how it would go.

I thought it would be more of a hit with Jet than it was Drew. We have a small rock climbing wall at our house. They both love it. But I did think Jet was going to be the wild man at the climbing place. But we show up and Drew gets on the wall and turns in, it was a new side of her we'd never seen. She found a passion in life. It's awesome. It unlocked something in her that we had.

yet to see and it like was a snowball effect so one jet not a huge fan he just kind of like wanted to run around the gym he wanted to go up and down the stairs good job Andrew yeah but Drew was like I want to do it again I want to do it again I want to try again I want to try this one I want to go to that one and she was all over the place for like two hours and she was so determined she would get a little bit higher and then jump off and get a little nervous and then be like oh I want to try again and she was saying things like this is my favorite place ever this is better than my birthday this is can we come here for my birthday can we come here for my birthday can we come here every

day she was obsessed but her personality like lit up she turned kind of giddy and then she she's usually talkative about certain things but she would turn to me and just be like daddy i love you which she never does i know and it was just really really cool it lit up like this confidence in her but then literally after we went home the snowball effect for like days afterwards, even till today. It's like she found a confidence in herself that she didn't have. She learned to ride a bike without wheels like the next day. She jumped on Jets motorcycle after Christmas and was like running with that around.

Anything that she was timid to do before rock climbing, she like all of a sudden could do it, which was, it was one of the greatest days of my life, honestly. It was really fun and very special. I'm thankful for that. So we did that a couple times actually. We spent a lot of time at home together doing some. science experiments. We took the kids to Habachi. Oh my gosh. The kids love Habachi. They're obsessed. So good. We go to Habachi once a week now. And then there were a couple things

that Sean and I did to preserve this time together too, including going to your iron appointments together. We try to be very aware and intentional during transitions together as a couple. Sean and I realized back when she was traveling a ton for appearances and speeches, the transitions were always the hardest on us. It was like just the preparation of leaving and then returning back from home. We just didn't thrive in because we weren't intentional. So now any transition, whether it's a trip for a couple of days or like a life transition, we've really tried to be with each other and communicate an open space for that. I've also noticed in both of us and I think it happens with a lot of people with transitions of any kind, whether you're going on a trip or a baby, or whatever there's like a lot of emotions involved on both sides that you probably aren't

voicing because they either don't seem big enough or whatever it is like I was terrified to have another baby I was terrified of childbirth I was terrified of all these things but I'm not like voicing all of them and you're probably thinking through so many things going into another baby so we tried to protect and have enough time one on one with each other to be able to say like I am really scared I don't know what this is going to do to our relationship or our marriage or to Drew or Jed and so we we had a lot of time to just kind of be together which was nice that's been one pleasant side effect of my dad's passing is

this tenderness of checking in with each other in a different way and like I don't know understanding how to communicate emotions better that doesn't come naturally to me where it's like trying to be like how do you feel and I'm like I don't even know what you mean by that you know pretty much so anyway so we actually learned from a genetic test that I have a interesting genetic variant that doesn't allow me to absorb iron and I've been anemic with every pregnancy but this one was like severe I like was I noticed it so bad. I had a horrible carpal tunnel. I was so tired. I literally, I was so tired. And I just, like, I had migraines. I had all this stuff.

And so I had to do, we tried iron supplements. We tried all these things. And we got close enough to the birth. They were like, we need to have you go in for iron infusions, which was great. It wasn't traumatic. It wasn't hard. It was just, like, getting an IV for a couple hours. You're doing an oncology center with, like, chemo patients.

It's like, the whole thing is like, wow, okay, this thing is fragile, but... Very, it was also humbling being in the oncology department because I'm sitting there pregnant, healthy, and it's just watching people fight for their lives. It was very, it was hard. A lot of good time to pray for the people around me and make friends. We were doing ice bass, though. Sean is not necessarily, you know, like,

made to carry babies naturally with your four foot 11 or your babies so super uncomfortable yeah already and then you had the anemia and all the things on top but we were doing whatever we could you took you did a great job taking naps i did a lot of naps this pregnancy which is great job eating food yep i tried to prioritize nutrition and health i tried to do everything right this time to have the easiest pregnancy and it was a little bit harder than normal just because i was so anemic but I felt so much better after the iron infusions so that kind of brought us up to two days before the birth the day before we go in it's a Monday the kids we're trying to keep their schedule as normal as possible we've been doing a countdown or like we did a countdown with them where I did

30 paper rings together so every day they got to like rip one off just to kind of build the excitement and like the understanding that a baby's coming something whatever could have been a good idea could have been a bad idea i don't know um so monday morning they got to rip off the last one and see that there's only one left and we were making a big deal of it and then we had to take him to school and if you know jet and if you know his school journey he loves school he's never had a bad day at school he's never been the kid that like drop off as hard where they cry and they don't want to leave he's always been very excited to go to school Drew has been harder that way she's had some like

um harder drop-offs I guess so we get there we drop Drew off and jet something happens like a switch flips and it's just I think the magnitude of him understanding what's happening or the transition because everyone's asking about the baby oh it's a day or when's a baby coming and it's just different and jet

just loses it and he just starts crying for mommy i pick him up and he is like wrapped around my body my neck hanging on for dear life screaming crying and i'm just like in shock i don't know what to do whether to just like take him back home i just don't know luckily he has the greatest teachers in the entire world who are the sweetest ever they basically like unclaw him from me take him into the classroom and we leave they texted me like literally five minutes later and they're like he's happy and playing and totally fine but i think it was just like the accumulation of nine months getting ready for this baby i broke it's hard as a parent in those situations where it's like what's the best way forward do i allow jet to be clingy or and should we not go to

school today and just take take them home i know or do we do what we set out to do what we told what we committed to do and it's like i don't know but it was also our last morning together and like we wanted to keep things normal oh my gosh so many things but i do think for the next hour i was hysterically crying a lot of tears a lot of tears understandably so it was just like the first sign that things aren't going to be the same and it was the first I got scared that like Jet was going to be traumatized and oh I don't know

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Starbucks. It's never just coffee. Is this going to mess up this beautiful dynamic that we already have? What is this new dynamic going to be? And there's a little fear around that. But anyway, we made it through that day. We did. Thank goodness.

And it was beautiful. We had, we picked them up from school. They were so happy. We had the rest of the day together. We cuddled. We watched movies. Went to habachi. Went to habachi again.

With a bunch of friends. It was really fun. we actually hung out with a couple groups of friends that all prayed for us and it was like just kind of a special time really thankful for the-abachi is a great meal before I see-section I'm just saying it used to be the thing that was like reserved for you good buddy that was reserved for like prom or like you know the fancy events so we go to bed I had to wake up at four we woke up for four at the clock because we had to be there by five it was also weird putting the kids down for bed that night because it was like I just don't know. I feel like you're going into battle. I know, so we woke up at four. Didn't have our bags packed. No.

Packed, showered. If you think about with Drew, we had our bags packed months before. Anyway. I did like a quick pack. I showered. I got ready. I tried to like truly just like get myself ready for the day kind of thing. Left by 440, 430.

and from then on it was pretty pretty chill. The nice thing about a scheduled C-section is you know that that morning you're going to have a child. Like I kind of knew based off how jet situation went unless there's a hiccup by like 7.30, 7.45, there will be a baby in our arms, which is really nice.

As opposed to Drew is like, okay, I'm going to go. Like I'm in the room. Should I go get food now or is the baby going to cut? Yeah, whatever. So we got checked in. We got to our room. It was the same room we delivered Drew and Jet in,

is crazy. We love the nurses. Oh, we love our nurses. I feel like we can share now. Yeah. We deliver at St. Thomas Midtown, and I cannot speak more highly of that place. The doctors are the nurses.

They have been the most amazing support system and community for all of our babies. Shout out to all the nurses there, honestly. Big fans. Thank you for your kindness, your warmth, all your help. It's a special time, and we appreciate your role in it. So, we go in, I get the blood work done, get pre-sectioned, you know, all your pre-selection stuff. Anesthesiologist was amazing. She had the coolest nails, I remember that.

She was a firecracker, man. And talking me through everything, again, since I have low blood pressure, a lot of times we have to, like, counter that, I guess. So we talked through any attempt to help me not puke for seven. hours you did a great job communicating that that with that and the rash with the tarp you communicated that well and i think it went better this time it went so much better so they wheeled me back to the operating room where i see doc doc is just chatting with me as i'm sitting there i was so nervous um i get so nervous and i always say the same prayer i said this in previous um podcast but like i always say the same prayer when i'm delivering a baby which is like god please protect this baby

we get them bring them to us safely and if you don't mind protect me too i'd love to hang around help raise this beautiful baby bless us with um so they did my spinal block they got me laid down they got me prepped um and then they bring Andrew in the docs I had a tripod and everything set up because we just posted my birth blog and it's a very important thing you get yelled at every time and I'm laying on the table and I'm like, can you not? There was a little confusion with, they didn't want me filming the doctors, which I totally understand.

It's like a surgical room and there's liability at stake. If they do something wrong and I have it on film, it's not good. So anyway, that's why if you watch the birth vlog, it's just me. But it had to deal with a little bit of that drama, which I was so mad.

I know you were. Sean was very mad. But then it was like, every time we do it, I have a better understanding of what goes on, so I'm able to kind of appreciate how it unfolds more. You freaked me out a little bit. So because we were able to control my blood pressure and stuff better this time,

I told Andrew I felt the most with it with this C-section. So I felt like I truly could grasp everything that was happening instead of feeling a little bit out of it. And you were standing up looking over the tarp, like watching. And I was just like, sit down. Well, I wanted to see his first, you know, time peeking his head into the world. And it was really special. I'm glad I'm glad it did so they finally yeah they have to do all these things and they're talking to each other and then the doctors are like all right we got about 60 seconds and then

you see a bunch of blood yeah and then you see like a little head and I'm just sitting there looking trying to find is that weird for you to see are you able to like detach your emotions from like that's my wife's blood yeah it's not the blood that gets me it's not the fact that like you know that you it's when I see a cross section of like what they're cutting into yeah and it's like whoa that's weird to me it's not the blood it's just like the oh they're really cutting through her stomach and you could see they cut through your stomach it's just crazy going on a side tangent I had the opportunity in high school to I could go to the I went to the hospital once a week and got to shadow surgeons and I remember it being such an interesting thing like on the other side of the

tarp where you're like operating you like emotionally can detach yourself from thinking that's a human being i think if you do it enough it's just like okay we got another c-section day i don't care what her name is but i do remember because of the spinal block so i always get the shakes really bad the like shock shakes but the anesthesiologist kept checking anything she's like are you okay because i was like taking really deep breaths and it's because the spinal block made my um diaphragm go so I couldn't feel that I was breathing. It was such a weird sensation. Yo, and this is what I picked up this time that I hadn't seen previously is when they say,

all right, you're going to feel a little bit of pressure. Yeah. There's this grown man, like 50 years old, I don't know, 220 pounds or something, puts his whole weight on Sean's rib cage or diaphragm area. And it was way more force than I was expecting. It was a lot. And to your credit, well, I guess you're numbed up, but it's like, no wonder you're sore. I've told you that before.

I was like, the only thing that is hard for me in C-sections is when they say the pressure, you literally can't breathe. So you have to, like, you have to calm yourself down for a second and be like, okay, you're not going to be able to breathe for a few seconds, but it's okay. That's crazy. So the head pops out, and then they pull the baby out, and the umbilical cords between the leg. So I'm looking at the gender, and I couldn't see. I had to, like, triple check, kept trying to get different angles.

And then I finally see, I was like, no way. It's a boy. I literally could not believe it. I thought 100% it was a girl. And then I said, baby, let me introduce you to Barra Madison East. And that was the first time we saw you, little guy. And I was in tears. I was more of a train wreck this time around.

Just because my dad. I don't know. Life just hits different, you know? I know. And I remember having the same feeling I had with Drew and Jet, which is like they pull them out. They cut the cord. Andrew gets to tell me I get to hear him cry

I get to see him they drop the drape so I can see him and then the whether it's like it's like the baby nurses the baby doctors and baby nurses that are in the room they take him for a second to weigh him clean them up

wrap them up and then lay them on my chest and that time frame feels like eternity to me because you're just anxious to get your hands on it It's just like, yeah, it's just, it's literally less than a minute by the time they get him to me. But it just feels like the end of the world.

Well, was cool. Well, immediately, as soon as we saw the baby, the doctor was like, oh, he's a little smaller than Jet was, or a lot smaller than Jet was. So then they go over and weigh him. He was 7 pounds, 11 ounces, which I'm pretty sure that was wrong because the second way in they do, which is like only a couple hours later, he was 7 pounds, 14 ounces. Yeah. Yeah, who knows. Which usually they drop, like, some percentage of their body weight. So we think he was low aides, mid-ates.

And he was 20 and a half inches long, which is pretty much what all of our babies have been. But then they wrapped him up and took him over to Sean. And he's screaming. He's screaming, but he relaxes after a little bit and opens his eyes almost immediately. And that's just such a special thing to see of, like, oh, this is a bond. Yeah. I love watching, even though I don't get to participate in. It's really special.

I remember that with Drew, Jet, and Bear. Like, they're screaming, and then all of a sudden they lay them. They, like, unwrapped them and lay him naked on my chest, which I love. And they just calm down immediately. And it's, they, what I love about delivering at Midtown, too, is they leave him there the whole time until, I mean, forever. But this little guy was so aware, more than the other ones, I remember. Open his eyes and looking around. And his cry was not nearly as vicious as.

Jets. Jets. Jets was like really loud, shrieking. Jets had the hardest cry. Yeah, this was like sad. Jets was a little more angry. And then I got to hold him and I love that little time with him. Andrew holds the way that the process works is he's on my chest until they get me sewn up. They get everything cleaned up. And then when they transfer me to the bed where I get rolled back on, as they're like transferring and stuff, they hand him off. to Andrew and you get to hold him for a few minutes

while I get transferred and stuff. So then we go back to the room and just enjoyed the next couple hours of you got nauseous once but it wasn't as bad. No it's like once or twice I had like a wave come over me where I was like I think I'm gonna puke

and again such amazing nurses went to the ends of the earth just to like make sure I kept my stomach down. Speaking of your stomach the stitch up process took a little longer because of the scar work they did. Do you want to talk about that? I just, I had so much scar tissue

and such an amazing doctor. I absolutely adore her. And she was just like, I cut every ounce of scar tissue out, sewed everything back up, everything looked good. What do you call it? Heeloiding?

Yeah, I keloid a lot, which is like my scars just continue to heal themselves. They don't like stop. The doctor said, no. The doctor said that Sean's core was so... thick that she had a hard time cutting through her abs.

It was scar tissue. That's what she was referring to. I don't know. I don't know. She didn't specify. You're such a dork. That six-pack you got going on. No, she said my core had so much scar tissue.

It took, she couldn't get through it. So it took a while, but. But, yeah, and I think it's been more painful in the recovery. Oh, so much more painful. The recovery has been the most painful. I feel back. not normal but I feel great now I don't feel pain anymore I get kind of sore but the first week was horrible there's so many headlines Sean let's just talk about this right now oh my gosh

addict Sean Johnson refuses narcotics as she heals after the C-section way to make something so dramatic guys I don't even know what she was talking about and then I got all these text messages with articles from people like my mom and I was like I don't know what this came from did your mom send that to you? Oh, your mom just thinks based off headlines

I was such a talk about that. Okay, it's not super dramatic guys but back when I was trying to make a comeback

there was a not so good doctor who prescribed me Adderall to help with my energy levels in gymnastics and to like

curb my appetite which is not what you prescribe adderol for I end up getting addicted to it and was on it just for many years because of gymnastics and this doctor. And I just remember feeling like it controlled me and I hated that feeling.

So when I was able to get off of it and to like get rid of it completely, I said I never want to feel like something controls me again like that. and so when it comes to like surgeries if I have the option of not taking narcotic pain meds I don't take them not because I was ever addicted to narcotic pain meds guys I saw a bunch of comments people saying oh I just stub my toe and I took whatever pill I was like I can't believe Sean isn't doing this after a major surgery so it's not that bad and the Tylenol and Motrin and the tort all that they give you It's amazing. But my personal choice during that is I'm able to get through that pain and be manageable.

So if I'm, why not go an extra step for me and just be like, you know what? I have an obsessive mindset. I don't want to ever like abuse something. Your pain tolerance is nuts. For those of you who remember when we were pregnant with Drew, Sean broke her toe at 30. 38, 37 weeks pregnant, something like that. A block fell on her toe. A cinder block.

And she, like, called me over. She was like, hey, I think we should go get this checked out. She was, like, physically kind of looked like in pain. I was in pure shock. Look like maybe she just stubbed her toe. So we go in there, and I kind of thought, uh, Sean's being dramatic. I was wrong.

I was wrong. But even the doctor, the first triage doctor was like, was like pulling on it. Wiggling my dough. And he was like, yeah, we can get it x-rayed if you want, but I think it's fine. So Sean was like, let's get it x-rayed. And he comes in a little bit later. He's like, it is shattered. So your pain tolerance is nuts.

I really respect you for that. And to your credit, you've spent a lot of time and effort kind of regaining autonomy on your life with, I think, your relationship with food, narcotics. You're just very aware of those things? It's not narcotics. Let's back it up there. That's the headlines. Sorry. I will say going down the road that you're talking about.

because I have struggled with like eating disorders and that type of thing I've seen so many headlines about narcotics opioids addiction I've had friends we've had friends who have misused them I've seen what they're capable of and because I've gone through a C-section before and perfectly managed that pain without them in my journey and like my delivery to me it was like yeah I don't need it

let me throw out the longest tease that's ever existed but we're actually writing a book about essentially this concept of compounding habits and compounding choices don't hold your breath and it's going to probably be a year and a half

two years we did we just finished a proposal though very exciting and I feel like you have done a great job at realizing what your strengths are, what your weaknesses are, and trying to compound the good things so that over the span of, maybe you don't even notice the effect that has over the course of a week or a month, but when we zoom out five or ten years, those things turn in,

those little things turn into big things. The same concept that makes you this insane elite gymnast, I think is the same thing, the same quality that makes you prone to being like an addictive, extreme, like at all costs. you know what I'm saying for sure it's something we talked about before I spend a lot of time and effort trying to keep myself like inside the lines I don't know how to say that yeah I think that's well said and I'm so used to from my childhood and from the Olympics and gymnastics feeling and thinking that extreme was normal that I try not to do that anymore. I try not to work out to extreme levels or time frames. I try to keep my nutrition normal and average.

I try to not be an anal perfectionist anymore. I truly try to stay within the normal lines of boundaries instead of, because my mindset would normally be like, oh, we're going to have a, I don't know, gonna run a marathon i have to do it the fastest yeah you go you go all in i don't suffer from that and i've never suffered from an olympic gold medal either so i think but if it's the same there's a headline for you someone's gonna pick that up um andrew e's says he's never suffered from that that's just an interesting concept that it actually come up with our marital therapist too where she said the same

thing that made you fall in love with sean is the same thing that caused you the most frustration She's super ambitious And you love that about her But now it's exhausting you or something You know I'm super free-spirited And you love that But now I'm terrible at scheduling still

Some magazines are going to have a heyday With these one-liners They're giving them Oh man Okay so back to it We're in the room That first day The first couple days really all in the hospital

It is like a vacation Especially when you have kids at home Just being able to sit in silence with the baby can we hear the baby breathing the little baby breathing and whimpering and oh it's adorable and shot and I don't even really talk that much

we just kind of enjoy that we chit-chat but this is a crazy thing I go out to tell my parents or our parents about the baby saying it's boy yada yada and in the lobby is two of my vandy football players and another friend. So there's three friends all at the hospital getting ready to have babies

at the same time, which turned into this really fun, like social hour. We're like next door neighbors with one of our friends. Exchanging baked goods with each other. Yeah, you get flowers of the whole thing. Someone's mom walk in. She was like, I just had to come see your baby. And I was like, okay. But I'm bouncing around a room. I was meeting the other babies catching up. It was like really fun. We ordered Uber Eats for all of us. And it was just. Yeah, we ordered the world's largest sushi order and distributed it amongst a few rooms. Oh, it was really fun. And then all of our parents got to meet them.

And we just kind of hung out. We were FaceTime and friends enjoying the time. We went through the series of tests that they do at the hospital. What was that a burp, buddy? That was a burp. It was stinky. He's a burpy little guy. He does a hearing test, which you passed.

I think it's always hilarious to see them with the little headphones on. He's gaining weight, which is good. It's slatched almost immediately. Immediately, which is great. Because it's a repeat C-section, because he was doing well and I was doing well, they give us the option to leave after two nights instead of stay the third.

And we were so... Sorry. That picture should not be shown, a little naked bear. We were so antsy and excited to get home to introduce him to his... brother and sister we ended up leaving the morning of the third day yeah yeah I feel like we had a good time in the hospital but didn't want to spend any more time away from our kids at home that we needed to um I will Sean was walking within hours of the surgery

which which is pretty normal that's normal I don't know dude you're just a beast your next level um is there anything else from these I'm trying to review these pictures and see what we missed. I'd say the only thing I remember about this one, or not the only thing. Another thing I remember about this one was, I was so, like, more, so much more.

Yeah. Swollen after this one than I was the other two. I was so swollen for the first week. You feel good now? Yeah, I don't, I don't mean it, like, in a subconscious way. I just mean it, and, like, I literally felt like my body was,

had gone through some, the most trauma I will say I feel like I had it really good with Drew and I was spoiled and I took it for granted but Drew didn't latch immediately and so we

pretty much bottle fed her do we bottle feed her in the hospital with formula? No no no no no she latched she latched in the hospital but she just never we just had a very hard time figuring out feeding she didn't have a tongue tie she didn't have a

lip tie. She didn't have cheek ties, nothing. She just wasn't a good nurseer. So by the time we got home, we had started bottle feeding pretty much. And the side effect of that was I got to spend more time with Drew and be up late at night and just get to know her in a different way. Whereas Jet and Bear pretty much have been your sidekick from the get-go because you're feeding them in that way. I have said though, and I want to say this to like new moms, breastfeeding is really hard. it's really really hard and it takes a lot of time to figure out I told you this the other day I do feel like if Drew was my second or third baby I probably could have I probably could have nursed her we probably could have figured it out

but especially since she was my first and I had no idea what I was doing I was more frustrated and overwhelmed trying to figure out how breastfeeding works that I ended up giving up before we ever like figured out a rhythm. Well, you gave it a couple weeks. Yeah. But, I mean, honestly, the whole first couple weeks is hard. Yeah. We're still in it. Yeah. There's, there's a lot to figure out, a lot of new transitions. We did, people loved the stories I did on the postpartum kind of rules that we follow. Oh, yeah. Andrew has postpartum rules. Well, I'll never forget when we did our labor and delivery class the first time we gave birth with Drew, you go into the hospital and they kind of walk you

through the process help you kind of get your bearings on changing diapers all the things um and they were talking about postpartum depression and how real of a thing it is and then a couple of our friends have suffered from that and it's like traumatizing it's a real thing for sure and so the nurse at the hospital was talking about some of the things they do so i took those and expanded upon them but essentially for the first six weeks after we have a baby so we're still in it our rules are that we're only watching comedy. Yeah, I'm not allowed to watch anything but comedies. Just trying to get giggles going, right?

Because I think that actually does train and reinforce neurological pathways. And there's a lot of time that you're sitting on the couch, maybe watching screen. So keep it to comedies. Get outside as much as possible. The first couple of days, maybe you're just sitting outside in the sun. Andrew would, every time he'd go into the gym to work out or go outside, he would set up like a chair and blankets for me and bear and he'd be like we're going outside you need to come outside and sit and I'm like okay well the first time I did I said hey I need help coaching with the

workout it was clever and so you're yeah but then now we're doing walks we started doing like one 10 minute walk and now Sean's going on a walk by herself while I watch a baby healthy food healthy food so we I mean if there's ever anything you're going to spend money on I feel like this is it like invest in trying to make it through this transition well and so the conjuring last rights rights, on September 5th. I come down here, I need you. Array! The Conjuring Last Rites.

Only in the theater September 5th. Oh, hi, buddy. Who's the best you are? I wish I could spend all day with you instead. Uh, Dave, you're off mute. Hey, happens to the best of us. Enjoy some goldfish cheddar crackers. Goldfish have short memories.

Be like goldfish. Buying as much healthy food and preparing that in whatever way works for you, hydrating is important. You were super dehydrated and Sean is not naturally good at that. But we also

I try to remind her as often as possible that I'm here to help and if she needs to get space from the baby like there's times of frustration with the breastfeeding. I can just tell and it's like, hey, let me take him for a little bit. Asking for help as much as possible.

We got a lot of helpful feedback from you guys with other things you do. So limiting guests to what you're comfortable for, which is something And I love, hey, come on in, meet the baby. And Sean isn't as comfortable with that. I think something, too, we've learned with each kid, something we did better with this one,

is mom is going to have a lot more, like, specific thoughts, preferences right after birth, than dad, probably. And I remember, Andrew, you asked me, like, what my expectations were when we got home as far as, like, visitors and if I wanted people to hold the baby or touch the baby or kiss like whatever it was and I remember you were really respectful in saying like what are your where are you with all of this and I said I really don't want a lot of visitors I don't feel like handing him off to anybody this time because I know I haven't really yeah I know it's like Drew I just needed a little bit more

space to myself especially with that transition I just needed to be able to go and get some quiet time with him I'm just like no I don't want anybody to hold him oh you okay might be time to wrap this up so yeah you've just been really helpful and respectful with that

the structured life shine I live is not for everybody but we do have a lot of the kind of quote unquote protocols for a lot of things so even with the older siblings we have methods of you know with jet meeting drew for the first time jet brought drew a gift we did that this time again the older

kids are like the gatekeepers for any new person meeting the baby so no one can meet the new baby without going through the two older first we have a lot of things we could talk about if you're curious to get thoughts to get our thoughts on these things let us know in the comments um but it looks like it's time to go and i'm so glad we were able to sit down and capture this before we forgot everything three and a half weeks later i love you you continue to impress me you are a great best friend a great girlfriend, a better wife, and an amazing mom. And I'm really thankful for you. You're my favorite person in the world, baby.

No one else in the world I'd rather do this with. So now I think we'll go on another hiatus, get back to interviews. So stay tuned for those in the next couple weeks because we have some fun ones. But that's how we have. If you made it this far and you haven't subscribed, please do so. Let us know in the comments, what your thoughts are on this. If you want any other issues addressed, and we'll see you next time. I'm Andrew.

John, this is bear. This is bear. Oh, you're peeing all over me. We are the East. Oh, my gosh. Seriously? Yes.