Our Birth Story...

Well folks, our little Lovebug has officially stolen our hearts forever. Her Daddy has already offered to buy her not one, but TWO cars, and she is the Princess of our household. We fall asleep each night thanking God for the miracle that she is.

I suppose now ya'll wanna hear how she made her grand entrance into this world? (If not, you should definitely skip this post) Well it didn't go as I thought it would... but I'm really thankful that I had a healthy outlook before labor, and knew that things don't always go as "planned." Bri & I woke up on Friday, July 1st at 3:40am because I had started to have contractions. We got out of bed, packed our bags, made PB and Honey sandwiches and thought we might be able to go back to sleep. By 4am, the contractions were too strong to sleep through and were now 6 min apart. Our plan was to labor at home until the contractions were 3-4 min apart or my water broke. Since I didn't want an epideral, I wanted to avoid the hospital as long as possible.

Cuddling with Mommy!

ALL DAY LONG the contractions stayed a steady 5-6 min apart and grew stronger and stronger. I had breakfast thinking surely this is my last meal, then lunch, then dinner and FINALLY by 8pm they were 3 min apart and we headed to the hospital. I got checked in by 9pm, was dialated to only a 3. We called the family to tell them to come on up, even though it could be a while.

I labored naturally and quietly, "blowing the contractions away" with Bri in our private room. The lights were off, we used Bradley positions to ease the pain, and Bri fed me popsicles. Our family popped in to see how things were going every once in a while.

Tummy Time!

By 10:30 I was dialated to 6cm and by 12:30 I was at 7cm! I thought that my water would break any moment and we'd get this party started!

No such luck... by 3:00am I was stalled at 7cm and the Dr decided to manually break my water. I thought this would surely get things started!

Cuddling with Daddy's Hand!

At 4:30am, 24hours after I'd started laboring, I was EXHAUSTED. My body was worn out, shakey, and I was pretty out of it. I was ready to get my sweet baby out! The nurse came in, checked me, and with a very sad face told me there was no change... I was still stalled at 7cm. The contractions were very painful and right on top of eachother with no break in between. Brian and I began to get a little worried. There was an increasing chance that if I kept going with no medication, I'd be too exhausted to push when the time came and the possibility of C-section would be hanging over us. So... I asked for the epidural. I just needed a bit of rest so that I could have the energy to finish. Little did I know that the decision to do so would be pretty important in a bit.

I slept for an hour after the epidural kicked in. I could still feel the contractions but they were much more tolerable, and I could feel my legs and move them normally which surprised me! When I woke up, I was at 8cm... finally some progress! By 8am I was at 9cm and at 8:30 I was ready to push!

She Loves her Wubba Nub!

Here's where that epidural and rest became very important... just as the Nurse & Doctor were getting me ready to bring our little girl into the world, her heart rate suddenly started to drop. They told me we needed to get her out quick, and so with the restored energy, I was able to push her out in 15 minutes after only 4 sets of pushing! I felt immediate joy and started to cry when they laid my tiny little baby on my stomach! The doctor was surprised at how tiny she was, since she had estimated Lovebug to be about 7 1/2 lbs! She cried only for a second, and then just looked around with her big beautiful eyes, and started rooting right away! They checked her over and cleaned her up before giving us our blessed bonding time as a little family of 3!

We got all packed up after 2 wonderful days in the hospital recovering... headed home... and spent only 1 1/2 days there before an emergency trip to Children's Mercy Hospital... I'll tell you all about that suprising turn of events in my next post!