So when I said I was way behind on posting, I meant I was
way behind. Scott and I were looking at Luke's very first pictures tonight and I remembered I hadn't posted any yet--so here you go!
I don't have any big belly pictures of me right before Luke was born. This is probably the closest I can get. I think it was about 34 weeks:
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I definitely look pregnant, but I don't feel like I ever got super gigantic.
I carried him low the entire time--never once felt him kick my ribs (just my bladder!). |
I worked until I was 39 weeks and 4 days pregnant, then took the weekend and the day before his due date (Tuesday, March 22) off to catch up on some sleep and try to clean the house a little. Luke took a while thinking about coming before he actually made his debut. I had pretty uncomfortable "practice" contractions every 10-20 minutes starting the weekend before he was due and going clear through until I went into labor. Sometimes baby would pull a fast one on us, with the contractions speeding up to even every 4 or 5 minutes, but then stopping completely right when we got our shoes on to go to the hospital. So much for catching up on sleep! By the time he was really ready to come, I was going nuts--7 or 8 days of pre-labor was enough to make me beg the universe for real labor to start. (Ha.)
Thursday night (March 24), Scott and I stayed up pretty late, as usual; by that point I wasn't getting much sleep anyway with the contractions, so it was kind of a nice excuse to play night owls. Scott had just finished his complete draft of his thesis the day before--HOORAY! We were both SO ready and excited for Luke to hurry up and come already. We went to bed at about 12:30 Thursday night/Friday morning. At about 3:50, I woke up with a GIANT contraction, bigger than any I'd had so far. After the second one of those, I knew it was the real deal (and so did Scott--I think I woke him up pretty quickly with my whining). Despite being pretty sleepy and in some pain, I was super excited to finally head to the hospital. It felt a lot like Christmas morning butterflies (in between contractions!).
By the time we got up to the maternity ward and started in on the paperwork (at around 4:30, I think), my contractions were coming 3 or 4 minutes apart and had me pretty much doubled over. I remember leaning on the desk where the nurses were calmly tapping on their computers and wondering why no one was grabbing a wheelchair or getting me into bed or at least offering me a chair or something--I felt like I was pretty clearly in labor! I think they started to take me seriously when I threw up in their trash can right after signing the release form for an epidural. At least, I think that's what I signed; I was starting to go into that alternate universe where it's just contractions and the time in between contractions, without much sensory input registering beyond that.
They got me into bed a little before 5 AM. If I remember right, I was dilated to about a 3 and at a low station, with nice, strong contractions registering on the monitor. The nurse kind of got me hooked up and took off for a little while. I think the plan was to wait for me to progress some more before trying much until the shift change at 6 was over, so I wasn't being watched very closely. The pain & nausea was bearable for me, but I was definitely mentally checked out. Scott was so great, standing guard & running interceptions between me and the nursing staff, but all of the things I'd thought about and we'd practiced to deal with labor pains went completely out the window. I didn't want to move; I didn't want to be touched. I just rolled over onto my side and held onto the bed rail for dear life. When I could open my eyes, I looked at a door stop on the far wall across from my bed. The idea of a focal point and trying to breathe slowly was all I could use from all the prenatal stuff I read & learned & heard about, but it was enough. Everything else was kind of a painful, moaning gray haze. I think the thing that surprised me most was how it seemed like I didn't get any breaks from the pain. I remember lying there thinking, "They said there was a space between the contractions!" I felt like I was just standing neck-deep in an ocean, with little waves marking small changes in the depth but never stepping out of the water. Nothing seemed to break up the time passing besides the breaths I took between moans and the times I puked. I remember my mom coming in right around 6 AM. I didn't even open my eyes, but the sound of her voice broke through my haze enough that I recognized she was there.
It was just after 6, I think, when I suddenly some primeval part of my brain registered a desire to push the baby out, and I got the vague sense that the nurse should know that. I think I kind of shouted, "I feel like I need to push," and suddenly there was a flurry of a half-dozen people milling around. I must have bad timing, because I think it was right in the middle of their handoffs between shifts, and the anesthesiologist was up to his eyeballs in patients, too. (Later they told us that they had 6 other women in labor at the same time as me, which was almost double the number they usually had.) To make a long story short, they got the epidural in just in time, not too long after 6 AM. I was dilated to an 8 by then--3 to an 8 in just over an hour. No wonder I was out of it.
Before going in to labor, I'd toyed with the idea of doing things "naturally," sans epidural. I know now that I could've handled the pain if I needed to (kind of an empowering thing to know about yourself), but getting the epidural in was such a blessing because it gave both Scott and me a much-needed chance to rest before the big event. I didn't love the side effects of the epidural (I think it made it harder for Luke and me to learn how to nurse, and it definitely left me pretty loopy and out of it for a few hours after), so I'd absolutely consider the "natural" route for baby #2, as long as I could go into things with a little more rest than I had before Luke arrived. But check out how happy we are post-epidural!
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| Popsicle time! (Boy, am I glad there were no pictures taken before this.) |
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| Feeling delightfully numb, just textin' the fam and watching the snow fall. |
It was slow, smooth sailing from there on out. We got to relax, take a little nap, and watch
Lion King (my favorite movie!) while we just waited. Luke was turned exactly the right way, and getting the epidural in slowed things down enough that he could progress without too much strain on him or me. His heart rate stayed good the whole time, and by the time Dr. Servoss was able to come help finish the delivery, he was ready to pop out without much help from me.
It was snowing like crazy, so it took a little while for Dr. Servoss to come over, but by 11:25 we were getting ready to push. I think the anesthesiologist had felt bad for me when he put the epidural in (because I was so far gone), because I think he must've set me at a gigantic dose--we turned off the epidural at about 11:20 and I was still totally numb an hour later. Pushing was a little tricky since I couldn't feel a thing, but with my mom & Scott's great help, the contractions monitor, and my AWESOME nurse, we figured things out well enough and baby popped right out.
Luke was born at 12:06 PM, after only 40 minutes of pushing and less than 8 hours of active labor. (I think just like he is now, once he decides he wants something, he's bound and determined to get it.) He was just perfect and beautiful.
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| Seven pounds, five ounces, 20.5 inches long, and absolutely perfect. |
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| Wiggling and stretching and trying out these hands & feet things. (Modesty edits courtesy of Scott.) He's never had that much hair since! |
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| All bundled up |
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| Snuggling with grandma |
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| First family photo :-) |
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| Here's little Luke! |
