I can't believe that our little girl is here and not inside my tummy anymore. The past 9 months have flown by, especially since I had such a great pregnancy and we were both so busy with work. But during the last week or so of being pregnant, it finally hit me and I was SOOO ready to get her out! I was starting to get really uncomfortable and each day I went to work, I wasn't sure if I'd be back for the next. So . . . here's the story!
A week before my due date (a Friday) we had a doctor's appointment, and I found out I was already 3.5cm and 75% effaced, apparently I had been having contractions without knowing it so they hooked me up to a monitor to just to double check. Sure enough I was having contractions, so I started to freak out a little because I'd been planning on having her a little bit later than her due date ( I know, I know, you can't plan these things, but I tried to!) I think that once my brain heard that I was dilated, efaced and already contracting, my body decided to give me some contractions that I could actually feel the rest of that day and throughout the weekend. My parents were flying in from BC on Tuesday night so I was hoping that I could at least make it until they were here. By Sunday night my contractions had slowed down and weren't as strong and I went to work as usual on Monday morning.
On Tuesday night after going to dinner with some friends Brandon and I went on a nice long walk before we went to go pick up my parents from the airport. Mom and Dad flew in around 10pm and on the way home from the airport I felt a bit of a trickle of water so when we got to their house I tried to figure out if my water had broken. Brandon said everything was fine and that we should head home, that there was no need to go into the hospital, so that's what we did! I fell asleep fine, but woke up around 4am on Wednesday morning with contractions. By 4:45 they started getting a little more painful so I used my nifty contraction app on my phone to start measuring. They were between 2-3 minutes apart for over an hour, and I was also getting more water trickling every so often. I had a doctor's appointment at 8:30am so we couldn't decide whether to wait until then or just go to the hospital – then my contractions started getting pretty painful so we decided to head to the hospital and ditch the doctor's appointment.
We got to the hospital around 7:30 am and we were taken up to triage right away. My contractions were getting super painful by then. The nurse told me that I was dilated to 6cm and 100% efaced and then scolded us for not coming into the hospital the night before when I had thought that my water had broken. Since I was strep B positive the risk of infection after my water breaks is much higher, so we should have gone in right away. I gave Brandon the “I told you so” look but at the same time, I was happy that we didn't have to spend the night in the hospitals – I hate hospitals! After one try and busting a vein on the front of my hand the nurse tried another spot to put my IV in . . . I think this was the worse part of the whole labor. Anyone that knows me knows that I am NOT a needle person, and holy crap did it hurt when she blew that first IV. A big blood bubble formed on the back of my hand, the nurse was applying SO much pressure, it killed! I think that pain was worse than my actual contractions! Since I was already at 6 cm and in a lot of pain they ordered my epidural and moved me to the labor and delivery room. The anesthesiologist came in and before I knew it my legs were full of pins and needles. I couldn't believe it – the IV was way worse than the epidural! I was so afraid of the epidural and it really wasn't bad at all, phew!
The nurse checked me right after I got my epidural and I had already progressed to 9cm since she first checked me in triage. Good news was that things were moving along, bad news was that I had already gone through the majority of the painful contractions without the epidural, oh well! I can barely remember what they felt like now, plus Brandon promised never to call me a wimp again since I made it to 9cm without any pain meds :) By this time it was about 9am and I had just been given antibiotics for my strep B. My doctor wanted them to be in my system for 4 hours before delivery, so it was a waiting game. I still had one small bag of water that needed to be broken, so labor wasn't going to start without that happening and we needed to wait for my doctor to come from a different hospital.
By 2pm my doctor arrived and broke that last bag of water and around 3 I started pushing. For the first hour and a half the pushing went pretty slow and I was starting to wonder why all the movies showed all the moms sweaty and gross while pushing, but by the second hour and when we were getting close to having a baby come out I was beyond sweaty and getting super tired of pushing. They had turned my epidural way down, so I could feel pressure and was able to get a handle on pushing a little better. Brandon was in charge of my left leg and my mom and dad were out in the lounge waiting anxiously. Mom said that she started pushing for me after it had been a couple hours and no baby was out yet!
Those pushes must have helped, because on Wednesday, September 29, 2010 at 5:46pm Harlow Mae Randall was born! She weighed 8 lbs 8 oz, was 21.5 inches long, had a big head (14.6” to be exact – that's big) full of brown hair and was as cute as could be. Brandon cut the cord and went over to watch as she was cleaned up. I was in shock that I had actually just delivered a baby and felt a little loopy :) Then they brought her over and laid her on my chest. It was perfect, my baby girl was out of my tummy and healthy and the cutest thing I'd ever seen (even with all the yellow and white goop on her) they covered us up in warm blanket and she immediately started smacking her lips and looking for food. She latched on right away and I was suddenly a real mom. Brandon snapped some pictures and in came Grandma and Grandpa to say hi to their newest grand-baby.
We stayed in the hospital for 48 hours after delivery because they had to test her for a few things since I was step B positive. We had some really awesome nurses and Harlow was a good little eater and sleeper while we were there, but I was so happy to come home to our own house! Our upstairs loft has been turned into a baby lair covered with receiving blankets, diapers, wipes, baby swing . . . the list goes on and on, but it's wonderful. I sleep on the couch at night so we can enjoy our feedings every couple of hours and Daddy gets his beauty sleep in the bedroom so that he can be a good help during the day.
I can't believe that it's been a week today that she was born! Time flies when you're not sleeping and trying to figure out all this baby stuff I guess. People warn you about not getting much sleep having a baby, but oh boy! The first few nights we were at home she would give me about 45 minutes in between each feeding but it's now gone up to around 2 hours and I'm so grateful! I'm still trying to figure out how to sleep when she sleeps during the day because I feel like that's the only time I have to eat, shower, and do any other miscellaneous things I need to get done . . . but I'm working on it. Brandon is such a good daddy, he's changed the majority of the diapers, and a couple days ago I started pumping a bit so that he could give her a bottle once or twice a day so that I could get a nice long 3-4 hour nap in. I think she likes him better because she doesn't have to work as hard to get milk when Daddy feeds her, but she'll still latch on fine and feed from me, so I think we're safe!
We went to her first doctor's appointment on Monday and everything looked great, she's healthy as can be and didn't lose any weight in between the hospital and coming home. She lost 7oz after birth which was average for her weight, and she should regain it within 2 weeks of birth, so we need to keep fattening her up. We just love our new baby girl, she's such a good baby, only cries when she's hungry, doesn't care if we change her diaper or wipe the gunk out of her eyes, she's very content and I'm super grateful for that :) We're going to take our first walk today (or as Brandon says, we're going to test out her new wheels) so we'll get some sunshine and fresh air which will be nice.
I think back to the whole labor experience and how scared I was and it was so much better than I expected! It's crazy to think that Harlow is finally here. We have a darling baby girl who we love so much and are having so much fun with her.
I'm going to try and keep this blog up to date a little better than I did during the last year and a half! I thought I was going to have all this time on my hands not working for 3 months, I made a list of things that I need to get done, but it seems like I have no time at all! I'm sure that's just what the first few weeks are like right? Then things will settle down? Here's to hoping!
Here are a few pictures - I keep forgetting that the pictures don't show up in the order you attach them, they're all backwards. Any expert bloggers know how to make them show up in the order that you attach them? So look at the pictures from the bottom up!
