The end of pregnancy... and the begining of Motherhood!

After a frustrating week filled with contractions... slow progress...and a failed trip to labor and delivery on Friday morning... Saturday finally brought us a little closer to meeting Baby C. Through out the day, I stared experiencing the "stop you in your tracks" contractions that L&D told me I should experience before heading in to the hospital. Unfortunately... they were only coming about once or twice an hour... mixed in with other less painful contractions happening morning regularly.

As the night progressed... and Saturday turned to Sunday... I started feeling them more often. Around 2 a.m. they were coming about 3-5 min apart. I tried my best to hang out... take a shower... etc. until about 3:30 when Brandyn woke up. We labored around the house until about 4:30 when I decided we needed to head to the hospital.

We were admitted around 5 a.m.(along with half of the other PG mom's in Walnut Creek). (The weather and barometric pressure apparently worked its magic sending us all into labor!). It was very busy but the Kaiser WC staff were excellent. By the time we arrive at the hospital, I was 4 cm. dilated. I had originally thought that I would try and labor naturally with no drugs... but after my morning at home and the hour and a half it took to get settled into a labor room, I quickly realized I was going to need some assistance! ;)

Around 7:30 a.m. the anesthesiologist arrived and she could NOT have gotten there any sooner! By then, I had progressed to 7 cm. and was definitely ready for a break. After I was settled in... we called out "the troops" (our family) and told them to get ready to head to the hospital. The next few hours went by slowly... totally pain free... and with a few naps interspersed!

They continued to watch my progress, gave me some Pitocin to help move things along, and broke my water. At this point they realized that Baby C had popped in the womb (not uncommon for over due babies). They were some what concerned that he may have swallowed some of the fluid... and let us know that there would be extra Drs. on hand we we delivered.

By 1 p.m. I was at about 9.5 cm., but the nurse suggested I wait for the baby to descend a little more before I started pushing. By around 2:30... we were ready. I pushed for 45 min... and he was born!

The first few mins were so unbelievably amazing! They placed Andrew to my chest and began checking him out. They quickly realized that he had indeed swallowed some of the meconium and told me they needed to take him over to the bed next to me to check him out. Brandyn went with and said it was a pretty scary time. They suctioned his nose and mouth and put him on oxygen. After about 10 min the Dr. expressed his concern for possible infections and breathing issues and told us they would need to take Andrew to the NICU (intensive care). They were very reassuring that this is not uncommon, but they wanted to be very cautious.

By around 5:30 p.m. Andrew was looking better and they allowed us to visit him. I won't share the pics, as he looked pretty pathetic hooked up to the oxygen, but he was very cute none-the-less! Despite being told earlier that he would likely have to stay in the NICU over night, Andrew was able to join us in our room around 10 p.m. It was the best sleepless night we're ever had... and we've looking forward to MANY more to come!!

Minutes after he was born...


Later on that night in our room...