Warning: Hospital details ahead. If that isn't your thing feel free to ignore this post. I'll try to keep it on the less graphic side. This is mainly for my journaling, so I will not be upset if you skip on to the pictures.
P.S. I am typing this with one hand- as little Eleanor sleeps like a champ if she's being held. Put her down? Not so much.
So. Late one night on March 11th I was working on painting bins to go under our changing table. Clayton had taken two Nyquil and gone to bed early as he had slept poorly all week. I was happily mixing paint and watching HGTV. I had just enjoyed a ridiculously unhealthy (but so happy) snack of chocolate Haagen Dazs ice cream and a chocolate cupcake around 10:30 pm. At almost exactly 11 pm I got up to get a different paintbrush. As I stood up from the couch my water broke. Not sure how anyone can mistake that for something else. I guess not everyone has it go so dramatically though. I stood there like a moron for a few seconds trying to wrap my head around the idea. "Really? Now?" I truly thought it would be at least a few more days, if not a week. Then I thought, "Oh, poor Clayton. I have to wake him up when he's just gotten to sleep. " Also- I really wanted to take a shower. Which is something they advise against as labor can start fast once your water breaks. However, this happened to be a day when I had stayed in sweats all day working on projects, and hadn't found a minute to shower. I figured it was worth the risk. So I go in and flip on the lights like a mom to a teenage son. He immediately asks what's wrong and I tell him. "Really?" I know, me too. He is ready in like two seconds while I take my shower (Where I shaved my legs?) and put on make-up and throw things in a bag. When I apologize for taking forever his only comment is "You are the ticking time bomb." True enough.
Even with all of my preparation we get to the hospital around 11:30 pm. No contractions yet, they say after your water breaks it can sometimes take another two days to deliver. Due to risk of infection though, they want to make it happen within 24 hours. I am down with that. So we get all settled and prepped and meet the night nurses assigned to me. Heather and Leslie. Nice girls, why two? Ha ha- ya. They acted like it was normal, but the only time you get two nurses is when someone is training. So each "check" and procedure got done twice. Lucky me. Aside from the IV (arghh, get it in there!) and the "checks" it wasn't so bad. I was contracting, but not feeling much. I have pretty miserable cramps normally (Sorry) so it takes a lot to register as "ouch". I was progressing well, I thought. Either they got bored, or wanted the training to be complete, because after about two hours they started me on Pitocin. That got things fired up. The contractions weren't horrific, but they were coming about 40 seconds apart. Also- little baby would not hold still, so they had to readjust my monitors about every 5 to 10 minutes. As that made every one's life a little less fun, they decided to do the internal monitoring. If you haven't had the pleasure, it's two wires that go, well, internally. One has a little wire corkscrew on the top that gets inserted into the baby's head to monitor her heartbeat. Ouch. It was about then that the epidural started looking really good. I fretted about getting it too early, I'm not sure why. If you are going to get one, does it really matter when? I thought no. So Mr. Anesthesiologist comes in (possibly the best person in the whole hospital) and performs his magic and life is now a dream. The contractions were coming bigger than ever, but I blissfully took a nap. The only downside is the dead-leg feeling. Creepy. I kept getting grossed out by how fat and dead my legs felt. So bizarre, but totally worth it.
When the night shift gals were leaving I was at a 6+. When the day shift nurse checked less than an hour later I was at a 10! We waited another two hours to start pushing to let the baby descend a bit more on her own. An hour and a half of pushing and our little girl made her arrival into the world at 9:56 AM. Right on her due date. What a good and obedient daughter we have.
She has a full head of dark hair, which I love. Both of our families generally have bald babies, so that was a surprise. I think her eyes will be blue, but that wont be for sure for a while yet. She has my eyes and Clayton's forehead and tongue. Very long little tongue. She also has my hands and toes, down to the curled under pinkie toe. She came out crying and tried to taste and eat everything right away, including the bulb syringe they suctioned her with. She is pretty easy to calm down (except at 3 am of course) and loves to be held. Her new favorite thing (and mom's) is the noise machine that Aunt Jenni loaned us. It plays whale sounds and what not, but we love love love the heartbeat sound. It keeps her sound asleep twice as long as she usually would.
She has turned our world upside down, and we are thrilled about it all. I can't imagine how lame our life was before she was here. We aren't the most experienced parents just yet, but are slowly getting the hang of things. Like this little lesson.
Don't let your newborn watch Band of Brothers.
I like to think that she was too far away to really see anything, but she had this seriously concerned look on her face the whole time.
However, she has so far really enjoyed Twilight. I know- I'm a nerd.
Clayton is a natural.
Here she is in her little ducky towel from aunt Alison and family.
We set her on the bed to diaper her newly clean self, only to have her christen the area. Nice. Lucky thing for the two towels. Ya- Eleanor is going to really love this blog some day.
