Moments & Memories: January 2009

Yesterday I took Elliot to his 2 week check-up. He weighed in at 11 lbs 1 oz which means he is just about back up to his birth weight. And he has grown just 1/4 inch. All these stats put him in the 97th and 95th percentile respectively. Even though he is so big, Guy and I still look at him adoringly as our tiny little baby.

After the appointment, I went to Guy's office so he could show off his son a little bit. Of course, all the ladies ohhed and aahed and one of his male co-workers summed it all up by saying, "You've seen one baby, you've seen them all."

Elliot is doing a great job at sleeping at night, usually only waking me up once or twice, and then he goes right back to sleep. He is such a good baby which is exactly what I needed after having Ashley be so clingy. Amelia and Ashley are both adjusting really well and for the most part just ignore Elliot most of the time. When we put the girls to bed at night, they love to kiss baby Elliot good night. It is so fun being a mom of three!

In the words of Paul Harvey, here is the rest of the story. I had a feeling that I would go over due with this baby. So, on December 26th, 2 days past my due date, I went to the hospital for a non-stress test. First they checked my fluid levels and found that everything was just fine. I had a level of 14. Then they hooked up the fetal heart monitor and contraction monitor and I just sat and waited for the baby to move so they could make sure the placenta was functioning the way it should. Since everything checked out good, I went home and continued to just wait for baby to come. On the 27th, I sat and timed contractions for 1 1/2 hours coming 10 minutes apart. But when I went to bed, they fizzled out. Nuts! So, I went to church the next day (just like I knew I would) and continued to wait.

On the morning of the 29th, I had another NST scheduled and then I would be heading straight to my appointment with my midwife in hopes that she would tell me that they could induce labor since I would be approaching 41 weeks. At my NST appointment, they found that my fluid levels had dropped to 5.7. They start to worry when level drop below 5, so technically I was ok to just wait it out some more. But, since they were on the border of being low, they had the Perinatologist come in and talk to me. He also talked to my midwife who advised that I go to Orem Community Hospital and have my cervix checked and then they would most likely induce labor. Finally!! Since this was a little unexpected, they told me that I could run home first and get my bag and then go to the hospital. I quickly called Guy and told him to get the girls ready because we were having a baby today! Then I called my mom to have her meet us at the hospital so she could take the girls. When I got home, I quickly packed a bag for the girls and for the baby, complete with a boy outfit and a girl outfit. We threw everything in the car and we were off to the hospital. At this point, Guy is feeling a little bit cheated since he has never been able to rush me to the hospital. We stopped for a mug refill for Guy and then at McDonald's so Guy could have a late breakfast and the girls could have a little snack.

Arriving at the hospital was uneventful. We checked in and were told that my midwife had called over and told them to induce labor without even checking me. Even better. So I changed into the beautiful hospital gown and got ready to be drugged with Pitocin. The girls enjoyed running all over the room and exploring where they would put the baby after it was born. They started the Pitocin around 12:30 and our wait began. Contractions were anywhere from 2 to 5 minutes apart. Guy pumped up a "birth ball" for me so that I wouldn't be stuck in bed for the entire labor. At 1:00, Jennifer (my midwife) came in and checked me and I was dilated to 4 cm. She wanted to break my water right then to kick start things a little bit more, but I convinced her to wait an hour and just see how things went. Well, she came back in at 2:00 and broke my water and found that my fluid level probably wasn't as low as they thought that it was. She also said that I was dilated to about 4.5 cm. Whoa, it seemed like things were going to take forever. Throughout labor, my contractions continued to be between 2 - 5 minutes apart and remained manageable. At 4:00, my LD nurse came and checked me and found that I was only dilated to 5 cm. Now it felt like we were going to be there all night, and I was getting really hungry for dinner. I tried to take a little nap from about 4:30 to 5:00 since I figured that I needed to conserve energy if this baby wouldn't be coming until midnight. At 5:00, I turned on the news to try and get my mind off of things. Guy received a phone call from his friend at 5:15 and told him that we were getting a little bit bored just waiting for this baby to come. During this time, I was starting to feeling the contractions more and I started breathing through them. Around 5:20, I decided to get out of bed and sit on the birth ball. Guy helped me out of bed and we did a "slow dance" for one contraction and then I sat down on the ball. While sitting on the ball, I told Guy that this position wasn't making the contractions feel any better so I thought that I would get back in bed. Just when he was ready to help me, I told him that I wanted to wait until "this contraction" was over and then I would get back in bed. But during that contraction, I started to feel the urge to push. Guy quickly pushed the "nurse" button and told them to get in there quick because I was having the baby!! Before I even got in bed, I told him to push the button again because they were not coming in fast enough. Jennifer calmly walked in and saw the look on my face and knew that this baby was coming. She checked my cervix just to be sure and found that I was ready to push. After about 3 pushes, our baby was born and Jennifer put him on my belly. I looked at our baby boy and then at Guy and said, "We have a son!" He was born at 5:42. Later we found out that there had been 4 babies born within 10 minutes at OCH. As the nurse carried him to the warmer, she commented on how heavy he was and said that she wouldn't be surprised if he was over 10 lbs. After he was cleaned up and they handed him back to me, the first thing I said was "Whoa! He IS heavy." The scales were still being used so it was a few minutes before we found out that he was over 11 lbs.

Right around 6:00, we started calling family to tell them the good news. When I called my mom to tell her, she surprised me by saying that she was at the hospital. Amelia was getting really antsy waiting for the baby to be born, so they decided to come back to the hospital. The last thing that my mom had heard was that I was 5 cm and we would probably be there a while. She didn't expect that I would be telling her that she had a new grandson. My sister was there too so that was really fun. My mom and sister spent the next little while calling family and friends to tell them about our baby boy. Then Guy took him off to the nursery for a bath. When he brought him back, he was all wrapped up in a stocking. We took our first family photo and then the girls were off to have a sleep over at Grandma's. It was an amazing day and I was happy that he came just in time so that I could have a hot dinner that night.