The Readiness Is All

These pictures were taken by my amazing friend Debra of Joyous Moments Photography. (She just moved back to Utah, so if you're looking for someone to do family photos, you should definitely look her up. She's amazing.) They were taken on July 14, 2012 when she was three days old, and I love them. Enjoy.

Well, I guess I didn't have too long to wait after that last post, because our little CB was born July 11! (I think I'm going to try to avoid using our baby's name on the blog just to avoid getting her in the Google system too early. If you haven't seen her name on facebook, you can ask me.) Here's the part where I post the story of her arrival in all the detail I want, and if you don't want to read a delivery story you can just look at the pictures of the pretty baby.

So after not being induced on Tuesday, I slept horribly Tuesday night and was SO done being pregnant. I was up every half hour, I couldn't get comfortable, and I ended up going downstairs to eat some cereal and watch Buffy until about 4:30 am. So when I got up to go to my appointment with the doctor at 10, I was feeling a little grumpy, and hoping he'd have something awesome to tell me.

So we went to the doctor, and he said I was almost a 5, that I was almost 100% effaced, and that he could feel the amniotic sac bulging. (Sorry if that's too much information. I warned you.) He also went ahead and stripped my membranes, and then we talked about options. He was going to be heading out of town, and he told me he could still break my water, or we could wait and see if the membrane-stripping worked, or we could break my water on Saturday if I still hadn't gone into labor, or I could just wait but he might not be around (and Eric's business trip was getting closer, plus he was going to do a job in Park City Thursday-Saturday if the baby didn't come, and I was getting nervous about that because if I was already a 5, it could be a quick labor.)

So we decided to go home and plan on Saturday if I didn't go into labor earlier. I lay down to take a nap, and Eric went to a business lunch in Salt Lake.

Except I didn't sleep much, because I started having contractions. They weren't horribly intense, but they were definitely different than my Braxton-Hicks contractions, and they were coming every 8 minutes . . . then 6 minutes . . . then I texted Eric and told him maybe he should head home as soon as possible.

So Eric got home and we checked our hospital bags one more time and timed a few contractions - which were about a minute each and 5 minutes apart at that point. I called Labor and Delivery, and they told me to go ahead and come in so they could start my penicillin IV, since I'd tested positive for Group B Strep. We checked in and they hooked me up to some monitors and did some checking, and they got the go ahead from my doctor for me to stay.

Feeling good!

Hey! We're having a baby!

For some reason, everyone seemed to have it in their head that I was going natural. I'm not sure where my doctor got this idea, since I believe what I said was, "I just want to see how I feel," and since I wasn't hurting very much I opted not to get the epidural right away in case I ended up being awesome at coping. They got me on the IV (after blowing out the vein in my left hand first - so much for those hand massages they showed us at the birthing class), and then the doctor came in and broke my water, and said they'd monitor me for about 20 minutes and then they could unhook the IV and I could walk around if I wanted to.

Well, after about 20 minutes, my contractions  were less manageable than they had been. They were coming really fast and hurt quite a lot, and suddenly I felt like I was going to throw up. So I decided that an epidural sounded super awesome, because they'd told me I couldn't deliver until at least 8, since I had to have a second dose of antibiotics after 4 hours. It was only 5, and three hours of feeling like throwing up sounded like something I didn't really want to do this time around, so Dave the anesthesiologist came in (he happened to be right outside when I made my request, so that was cool) and he gave me a super quick epidural. Within 10 minutes I was feeling much more relaxed, but I could still move my legs and feel a little pressure during the contractions, so it was great.

Contractions starting to hurt a little more . . .

Talking with our nurse, Courtney.

 They decided to check me again, and at that point I was still a "5 heading to a 6," so they decided to put me on a light pitocin drip. I'm not sure why, because they didn't want me to deliver until 8, and it was still pretty early. They ended up taking me off of it within 20 minutes, because by then I was already a 7 and I was basically having one continuous contraction, since there was no time between the end of one and the start of the next one.

Eric and I worked a crossword puzzle, and then watched the last episode of Doctor Who series 6, and by the end of that, I was feeling a LOT of pressure through the epidural. I called the nurse, and she checked me and said I was a 9. She called the doctor and he told her to give me my second dose of penicillin even though it was only 7, because he didn't think I would make it until 8.

At about 7:20, the nurse came in and said it was time to start pushing. This was a new idea to me - for some reason I thought you didn't start pushing until the doctor got there. Silly Megan. But I could definitely feel when I was supposed to push, and the nurse coached me so that I wouldn't give up too early, and after about half an hour (possibly less?) Eric told me he could see the baby's head of dark hair. (I had an internal party in between contractions, since I'd been really hoping she'd have some hair.)

Except there was a tiny problem. The doctor wasn't there yet. So even though I'd spent half an hour wishing I could stop pushing because it wasn't terribly pleasant and I was tired, and now all I wanted to do was push because she was about to come out and I could hardly stop myself from pushing, they kept telling me to try not to push. "Little pushes!" they kept saying. And after about 20 minutes of this, I'm not sure whether my tired self just decided not to care about the doctor, or whether I just couldn't stop her from coming out anymore, or whether I heard them say he was close and decided that was good enough, but out came the head, and my nurse, Courtney, went ahead and caught it. Someone came in right then, and I heard Courtney say, "Please tell me Doctor Ward is out there!" And just then he ran in, looked at the gloves, and then decided there was no time. He came over, pulled out the rest of the baby, handed her off to the waiting nursery nurses, and delivered the placenta.


I was shaking uncontrollably at this point from some combination of fatigue and adrenaline and epidural, and they came and handed little CB to me as the doctor started sewing up my second degree tear. After a minute, Eric said, "Are you feeling that?" because apparently I was wincing a lot, and the doctor looked up sharply and said, "Are you?" And indeed, I was feeling everything. He told me to push the epidural button a couple more times, but it didn't really kick in before he was done. After a couple of minutes I had Eric take the baby, because between the shaking and the tensing for the stitches, I was afraid I was going to crush her. They went ahead and weighed her and did some assessments there in the room, then the doctor finished, shook my hand, and headed out. (I have some awesome blurry pictures of me with the baby at this point - which will not be posted on this blog - but my face goes from really happy to really in pain and back again. Good times.)

As soon as they finished, they brought CB back to me so I could warm her up and start trying to feed her. At that point the shaking was starting to slow down and I could really see how beautiful and amazing she was. She was so alert, with big bright eyes looking calmly at everything and soft dark hair all over her head, and long fingers and toes like her daddy.


The rest of the next couple of days was just a series of visits from the grandparents and a couple of my sisters-in-law, holding the baby and having her taken for tests or shots, and having my blood pressure taken while they pushed on my stomach and asked personal questions about my bodily functions. I was a little sore, but otherwise quite happy. Eric got to go with CB for her first bath, and the nurses were smart enough to send him back for the camera. So now - a barrage of pictures of my baby (which you may or may not have already seen on facebook - I haven't raided Grandma's camera yet). 

CB was not a huge fan of the sponge bath . . .

. . . until they washed her hair.

A visit from Aunt Julie!

So alert and calm.

Taking advantage of a moment free of prodding nurses

Daddy enjoying some time with his baby.

Getting ready to go home. CB was hungry and everyone kept coming in to get us to sign things.

This was after she finally calmed down and resigned herself to the carseat.

Made it home! So happy.

Hanging out with daddy later that night.

Sleeping while mommy puts on her makeup.

So far, CB has been a delight at home. She's been sleeping for longer stretches at night than she does during the day, she eats well, and she's just generally pleasant. I'm not sure how long that will last, but it's been awfully nice for her to be so sweet while I'm recovering, and we will not complain if she keeps it up. Either way, we feel very lucky to have her here!

Once upon a time, my doctor told me he thought my baby would come early. Last week. As in, she should be here.

Now, I don't want to seem impatient, but I was really disappointed when she didn't show up last week. Partially this is because I am feeling like I'm the size of a largish truck, and partially it's because Eric's work is such that last week would have been a nicer week from the whole having him around to enjoy all of the baby-ness perspective. It would especially be nice because he has a business trip scheduled for next week, and if she got here sooner, he could be around for more time while we're figuring all of the new baby stuff out. (Yes, my mom will be around, and yes, that will be helpful, but I still really want him to be here for that stuff because it's our baby. You know?)

So I went to the doctor on Friday, and he told me I was dilated to a four, for crying out loud, and that I just need to have some regular contractions to get this baby out. And then he offered to break my water on Tuesday (tomorrow) and said that he thought labor would probably just start after that and I could walk around until I was ready to push, blah, blah, and I probably wouldn't have to be on pitocin.

And at first, I felt like that was an amazing option. I had dreamed of someone offering to just break my water and have this baby come. Tuesday would be a perfect day to have this baby. We'd have a whole week to be home before Eric left for a few days. Surely after I week I would know how to feed her and put her down for naps and stuff. Right? So I spent about two days in total bliss.

But then I spent yesterday completely agonizing over everything. Because 1) I'm still only at 39 weeks. It's not like she's late. There's nothing wrong with me or her that we know of. She feels late because I thought she was coming last week, but she's actually not at all. 2) Okay, so the doctor says he can just break my water and she'll come. BUT. Once your water is broken, most doctors want you to deliver within 24 hours to prevent infection. Which means if I didn't immediately go into labor, at some point they would probably put me on pitocin (which I have kind of wanted to avoid if I could help it all along) and if for some reason that didn't work, I could end up having a C section. Or even if it wasn't because of that, inductions can just cause complications, and if anything happened, I would always wonder if it would have gone better if I'd just let her come on her own.

Obviously any of these things could happen if I just went into labor normally, but if I make that choice to let them break my water, then I will feel like it's my own dang fault for making a decision because I was impatient and anxious about a business trip.

So today I called the doctor and cancelled - or at least postponed - the water breaking extravaganza. My doctor was very understanding and told me that I should definitely do what I felt good about, and to come in for a regular appointment on Wednesday. Which means now I'm back to feeling like she might not ever actually come on her own - but at least I feel better about waiting.

Here are the last couple of projects from the nursery that I promised to post when they were done.
The mobile itself is made from two embroidery hoops wrapped with some yarn I had left over from a blanket I made (below). It was a pain and a half trying to get the hoops to hang straight, but I got it to a point where I could feel moderately satisfied.

My mom and I tied this one while watching a couple of episodes of Downton Abbey. I just couldn't resist these cute fabrics. It will be a more wintery blanket than all of the nice jersey and muslin ones I got, but it's cozy.

This is the only blanket I made without help, and I got to test out one of the decorative stitches on my Christmas sewing machine. It's made from the leftover forest fabric that inspired the whole nursery.

Finally this is not something I made, but it's something I found and loved, so I'm posting it. Check out this awesome little cube I found at Target for putting the random toys and teething rings and such that I wasn't sure what to do with! I couldn't resist. (And I had a gift card.)

Well, here we are sitting around waiting for this baby to be born. I wouldn't be waiting quite so anxiously, except my doctor told me he thought she'd come early - probably this week - and if she doesn't I'm going to be a little put out. (For those of you keeping track at home, I've now been dilated to a 3 for 2 weeks.) Even my fortune cookie mocked me last night. "Good things are coming to you - in due course of time." Stupid fortune cookie and Braxton-Hicks contractions.

This weekend, Eric and I got some last-minute free tickets to see Hairspray at Tuacahn, and after some debate about whether it was wise to go to St. George when I could have a baby any second, I decided that the birth wasn't imminent and we decided to go. We headed straight down after a family reunion in American Fork, during which my mom and aunts told us we were nuts and my dad and cousins all said, "Hey! They have hospitals in St. George!" Other than some swelling feet because it was crazy hot in St. George at an outdoor theater, the trip was a raging success. Since we got the tickets through a networking group Eric is part of, we even made a business contact with the couple we were sitting next to, which could potentially result in some future business. (And even if it doesn't they were delightful.) Also, because we stayed overnight and didn't make it back in time for our church, everyone in our ward was freaking out because they thought I'd already had the baby, which was entertaining.

Probably just as well that we didn't have to have the baby in St. George

While we were on the road, my sister-in-law, who was about two weeks further along than I am, had her baby. She is beautiful, and I'm glad that although Kristi's labor experience was rough, they both made it through and can start bonding without rib kicks.

Last week, my friend Becky offered to take some pictures of me pregnant and with Eric, and she just sent them to me. Apparently I picked the right shirt to make me actually look as enormous as I feel (I feel like I don't look terribly pregnant in the pictures from the shower, and that was less than a week before - I assure you I haven't grown that much since then - but I suppose also that at the end of your 37th week you are supposed to look enormous) BUT I was having a good hair day, and the coloring is really nice, and Becky is very talented, as I've now mentioned in like three blog posts in a row. Observe.





Finally, yesterday we closed a deal to sell Eric's car, and today we used the money to finish paying off my student loans, so now we just have to worry about Eric's, which thanks to TFA have not been collecting interest until now. We still have a way to go, but it's a really good feeling to only have to worry about one set, and the set with a lower interest rate to boot. (P.S. Remember how everyone was freaking out about the doubling interest rates of student loans? The number they were talking about doubling them to was what mine already were, so I'm not sure how I got the raw end of that deal.) In any case, we will miss Eric's lovely car, but hopefully her sacrifice means that someday we will no longer have any student loan debt, and that someday after that we can have a car that isn't a two-door Civic and will be a little more carseat friendly. Until then . . . we'll just have to squish.  (The carseat is already installed in the back seat, and it's a little crowded, but doable. And by doable I mean . . . will be doable when I get to evict this little gal and can actually climb back there without wanting to die. Eric installed the carseat and told me he'd show me how it works after I deliver, since right now it will just be frustrating and awkward.)

All in all, it's been a good week. Now if this baby would just make her appearance, it would be a GREAT week.