In case you're wondering why I haven't blogged in nearly a week, it's because my hands have been full with my brand new infant! Little Quint was born at 12:26pm Tuesday, September 15th. He weighed 7lbs, 7oz and was 19 1/4 inches long.
Monday, I went in to the doctor for a quick check of some vitals, only to find my blood pressure ridiculously high. Since I was 37 weeks pregnant which is considered full term, my doctor wanted to induce me that day! Needless to say I was shocked! My Hubby hadn't even gone with me to that appointment. Being a bit hormonal at the time, I burst into tears. My doctor explained the risks involved with waiting, and how the baby was plenty "done" anyway. It would greatly help my health and wouldn't hurt the baby. I called Hubby and turned his world upside down. The doctor came back to me in a few minutes and let Hubby ask her any questions he had. We all agreed that I would go home, finish packing, take care of some things and check in to the hospital by noon.
No telling what folks thought of a huge pregnant woman walking out of the doctor's offices crying, but suddenly I didn't feel so ready to be a mom quite yet. Hubby told his co-workers what was happening, called half the world, and wound up beating me back to the house. He let me cry for a little while and then we started getting ready to go. I wanted to wash my hair, and we needed to pack up the computers. My bag was already packed and at 11:15 we were ready to go, but wondered if we should hang out for a bit or go look at the lake and arrive at noon. Nah, might as well go ahead and go.
We checked into the hospital feeling like we were moving in. We had my suitcase, my purse bag thingy, the boppy, and Hubby's computer bag. They started the IV and started the induction at about 1pm. We were in for the long wait since I wasn't dilated at all. The PG version of the procedure is that I was given one drug to "open the door" before we started pitocin to "put anything through the door". We emailed folks, Hubby played his computer game, I wrote thank you notes, they let me eat dinner, we called people, etc. At midnight my water broke all on its own, and at 2am I asked for some pain medication. Demerol is FUN!!! And it apparently makes me chatty. Hubby was finally telling me to just shut up so he could get some more sleep in the horrible chair/bed thing he was sleeping in. Somewhere during the night, probably between 2am and 5am, they started me on pitocin. At 4 or 5am, I asked for my epidural and then was really out for several hours. At 7am, I was dilated to 4cm and the family was back in my room to hang out during the wait. It's really weird to sit up when you're numb from the sternum down. My folks and Hubby's mom were there for patient entertainment.
At 11am, they said I was fully dilated and could start pushing soon! REALLY?! Cool. Everybody but Hubby left and I started pushing. For the first hour of my 90 minutes of pushing, I would drift off to sleep between contractions. Now that is the way to labor in my opinion! At noon, my doctor came in to help with the final push and catch. At 12:26pm, our precious baby boy bounced into the world! I can't describe all the emotions running through both of us. Hubby has tried to explaine it to folks. He says that you think you know the volume of love you're able to have for anyone else and then suddenly you're able to love so much overwhelmingly more. Hubby cut the cord and we both gawked at our curly headed little boy. They let me hold him for a few minutes, then moved him over to the warmer to get him cleaned up. After a few minutes I got my boy back and since I was cleaned up, the family came rushing in! It was really fun to show him off! He was maybe an hour old when he went to the nursery for all his checks, bath and whatnot. Hubby went with him and Quint held his finger for an hour and a half while he was checked out and brought up to a good temperature.
Apparently, because he did more grunting than screaming when he was first born, there was some concern about his lungs not being cleared out properly. They kept him longer in the nursery to make sure he got some good screams in and really cleared out his lungs. The result back in my hospital room was a very ticked off new mama who had a 2.5 hour old child somewhere that wasn't in her arms and didn't know why. So there were some sharp words with the only nurse in the whole place that I didn't like and I had to wait a while longer to see my little boy again. His lungs cleared out and he got warm enough, and my little boy was brought to me in due course, and I got to gaze at his royal cuteness once again. We took 400 pictures, tried to pin down the exact color of his hair, kissed his head and basically sucked all the goodie out of the whole experience.
We had some visitors in the evening and I sent my Hubby home for a good night's sleep. At some point in the evening, I gave a first shot at breastfeeding which had minimal results. During the night, he slet in the nursery and was brought to me for feedings. With the second attempt, I was gratified by the nurse saying I was doing everything right for him to nurse, but not much doing. By the third attempt, we had some success! And thus ends the first day of our little Quint's life.
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