She's here!

Sidenote - Sorry for the delay! It happens these days. :)

If you missed Part I, you'll want to read that first (here).

6:00 PM. Mom calls J. It's go time!

J arrives in record time, a bit frazzled for sure, but he's there and he has our hospital bags (Remember when I made asked you to pack a bag and you told me you had plenty of time, you're welcome darling).

7:00 PM. Mom heads home to get some rest (begrudgingly :) ). Who knows how long this will take.

8:00 PM. 6 1/2 cm dilated. And it's epidural time. There's a line-up of 4 emergency c-sections so they give me my epidural now before they're held up for a while and I end up real uncomfortable. Fine by me!

I'm starving but it's clear liquids only. Boo. Italian ice it is! It's been years since I've had one of those and damn it tasted good.

10:00 PM. 8 cm dilated! Omg. They tell us to try to get some sleep, it could still be awhile, but HOW AM I SUPPOSED TO SLEEP??! Jay's actually snoring by my side....he's got an awful head cold and I keep asking him if he's ok and how's he's feeling. Pretty sure he wants me to just stop talking but I can't help it. He especially loves how I keep asking him how he's doing when I'm the one IN LABOR. Whoops.

I'm still starving so I test out ginger ale hoping the bubbles will help me feel full. Eh, kinda. And I spend the next couple hours between pinterest, facebook, instagram, etc. A.n.y.t.h.i.n.g. that will distract me.

Sunday, July 20

12:00 AM. 8 cm dilated. Wait, what?! No change. Ughh. Come one Baby C! Mama wants to meet you.

A little motivation!

4:00 AM. 10 cm dilated. Big gulps. Now it's really go time! J texts the moms, they're ready and waiting to meet their new grand baby.

This time goes by in a bit of a blur. I haven't slept in far too long, I'm starving, and I'm just not very strong anymore. J and my nurse are amazing and I don't know what I would have done without them. I keep telling J I'm either going to pass out or puke - labor is no joke.

After an hour or so it's decided I need an episiotomy (fantastic...). J will be doing the honors of announcing Baby's C's gender and cutting the umbilical cord. The delivery team is in place. Ah!!

One last push and the doctor notices that the umbilical cord is wrapped around baby's neck so she makes the quick decision to cut it during delivery.

5:28 AM.  J turns to me, huge grin, and tells me it's a girl. I couldn't believe it (really, I turned to J and asked him if he was serious). I have a daughter! And she's just the most beautiful baby ever.

5:30 AM. (Due to the cord being around her neck she's taken aside for check up almost immediately). No skin to skin as planned. Still waiting for a good lung clearing scream from her....
5:32 AM. And waiting...
5:34 AM. And waiting...She's grunting and doing everything she can to breathe, but she's having a bit of trouble. Baby girl swallowed too much fluid on her way out.

A respiratory team has been called and a NICU doctor is on site. J watches over L while they do everything they can to help her out. I'm exhausted, still need to get cleaned up by the doctor, and my nurse keeps telling me she'll be fine. She just descended too fast and needs a little attention. I feel like I'm in a state of denial and shock. I cannot look at J who's looking at the doctors working on L for nearly 40 minutes.

While we keep being told everything will be fine, we're given less than 5 minutes to meet/hold our girl before they need to cart her off for chest x-rays and further examination in the NICU. Bless my nurse for stealing my camera to snap a few first photos of us.

J goes with the team to the NICU but I cannot get out of bed yet thanks to the epidural. And right now, I need him to be with her. I can't even begin to tell you how strong my husband was during this. I still tear up just thinking about it. He was/is my rock. And I needed that. I needed him to tell me that she'll be fine. 

Apparently it was a bit of a sob fest when he met the moms in the waiting room and told them they had a granddaughter! The fact that he held it together for me is unbelievable. No joke, I'm tearing up typing this. #hormones

7:30 AM. Just me, my incredible husband, and our new baby girl. 

L spent 3 days in the NICU, and 1 night in the Step 2 care nursery before passing her final test and being discharged to come home. While it was definitely not how we imagined her delivery to go, we are beyond thankful to have a healthy, happy baby. We are so grateful for the NICU nurses who cared for our girl, and taught these first-timers a few things. I'm not sure I'll ever forget their names.

We like to think that L just joined the world about 36 hours too soon. For that's how long it took her body to adjust, which was long enough to keep her under the NICU's supervision the whole time and in the hospital a day longer than expected.

Welcome to the world baby girl! We are so blessed to call you ours.

It's Go Time

I'm doing my best to soak up every minute I have left at home before heading back to work Monday. It's going to be quite the adjustment, but we'll do our best.

For this reason, there have been days the laptop stays shut. It's amazing how quickly priorities and routines can change! Sorry blog, you've been bumped down on the list. But, it's really important to me that I document L's birth story before we're in 2015 and she's suddenly crawling, walking, etc. So much happened and I want to remember every detail.

Honestly, I'm still in shock at her arrival before her due date. I seriously did not see it coming! So here goes:

Friday, July 18: I head off to my last day of work before maternity leave! Even though L's due date wasn't until the following Wednesday (which is when my company's maternity leave kicks in), I decided to take paid time off/vacation days Mon/Tues.

On the way to work I stop at my OB's office for our weekly visit/check-in. Not surprised at all to hear we've got no activity at all - 0% dilated, 0% effaced. We make plans for our visit the following week where we'd most likely discuss my options for getting induced. In my head I'm thinking, perfect. I'll have a few days at home to tidy up the mess our kitchen reno has created, get a mani/pedi, float in the pool, etc. Can't wait!

I stay later than planned at work to do my best to close out as many open items as possible before I'm out. I cancel J & my dinner plans in the city, we can go next week!, and finally head home. As a last ditch effort to get a good nights sleep, I take Benadryl before bed.

Which keeps me up alllll night long. Ugh.

Saturday, July 19:

7:00 AM. Exhausted. Freakin A, why did Benadryl have a reverse effect on me.  J's up early to help his parents move before heading out on the boat with my dad. Tucker's been staying with my parents while our kitchen reno occurs so I head down to their house to relax with my mom while the guys are out on the water.

1:00 PM. We head out to grab lunch and my mom asks me if I'd like to split a sandwich at our favorite local place - Cravings. I decide it's probably best if I get my own, I'm pretty hungry (thank god I did this).  So we eat lunch and watch some TV before deciding on naps.

2:30 PM. Hmm, that's odd. I think I just had a Braxton Hicks contraction. And another. And another. What the....?! My mom heads upstairs to take a nap in her room and I do my best to nap on the couch but these cramps keep coming back. I haven't told her yet or messaged J. I decide to time them on one of the pregnancy apps I have first and see what happens. I grab some more water, take a walk around the house/driveway, and continue on in my state of denial.

4:00 PM. Contractions are at most 5 mins apart, but down to 2-3 mins apart at times. And are lasting up to 60 seconds. Omg.

J texts me to let me know he has his phone if I need anything (talk about timing!). I reply ok, have fun. I know I'm just going to get sent home and told it's false labor, right? So I'll just wait it out here instead.

This little voice in the back of my head reminds me of the many times I've read about when to go to the hospital: the 511 rule = 5 mins apart, lasting 1 min, for 1 full hour.

Ok, they're averaging 3-4 mins apart, lasting 1 min, and it's been over an hour. Eff. I call the Dr's office, just in case. And they tell me to head to the hospital. WHAT?!

4:30 PM. Moms sleeping, J and Dad are OUT ON A BOAT! I wake up my mom, tears start flowing and I ask her to take me to the hospital. I'm feeling like such a fool right now because I KNOW they're going to send me home.

We grab iced coffees on the way, priorities, and I finally call J to tell him what's happening. HE DOESN'T ANSWER! Seriously. Not that surprised, he never hears/answers his phone....so I let my mom call my dad. But to tell them we're going to just go see, not to worry yet (they start making their way back to the marina anyways, my dad was great and calmly told J what was happening. J said it was the longest return to dock ever of course).

And I tell her not to make another call. Unless and until they tell me it's go time, let's not get anyone too excited.

5:30 PM. Check-in at the hospital and get hooked up to monitors. My phone dies (of course).

The Dr comes in and checks what's going on. I'm starting to feel embarrased, as I know she's about to tell me we've got no activity yet. Same as yesterday. But she begins to talk and I hear the words 4 cm and you're not going anywhere. If it was physically possible, my jaw would have hit the floor.

6:00 PM. Mom calls J. It's go time!

Baby Girl

On July 20, 2014 our lives were forever changed by the birth of our baby girl, L. I remember the weekend as if it were yesterday and I hope these memories never fade.

Before I share her whirlwind birth story, I felt I needed to at least introduce you all to her! I've chosen to cover her full name but her nickname is Lucie and I will refer to her as L going forward on the blog.

We are soooo in love with this little lady! 

Pictures for our birth announcements were done by the talented Beth Miga. And I used Etsy for a template (which my brother-in-law was kind enough to then tweak for me). 

She has been such a joy. And it's hard to believe she'll be 8 weeks this coming weekend. Gah, where did the time go?!

I plan to take a monthly photo of her and add a small recap of her current stats. It will be so fun to look back! So here's her 1 month summary:

In between play time, nap time, and feedings posts are definitely taking a bit longer to put together these days! But I'd love to get her birth story written up soon while it's all so fresh in my mind.