Made in Oregon: November 2010

Wow! Can you believe it!? Baby decided to surprise us with an early arrival and he is healthy, happy and melting our hearts! :) This post is going to be a bit long, but I want to document his birth story so that I don't forget any details.

It all started on Friday, November 12th. Steve and I headed to the doctor for a routine appointment to see if I was making any progress towards baby arriving. I was hopeful he was at least getting ready as I had had a really rough week. All week I felt so crummy. My back hurt, my body ached, my ribs hurt, my belly hurt and I was beyond exhausted. So into the doctor we went only to find out that I was not dilated at all and baby showed no signs of coming any time soon. "We'll check again in a couple of weeks" was the doctor's comment.

Flash forward to 2 am that same night when I rolled over in bed to the shock of my water breaking!! I ran to the bathroom, called out to Steve in a panic, "Steve, Steve I think my water broke!!" He asked if I was sure and I said "pretty sure" and we spent a few minutes trying to come out of the fog of sleep and wrap our brains around what was happening. One thing I knew was that it was still a bit early for baby to arrive and if your water breaks there is no going back - no stopping labor with medication, etc. If it really was my water we were going to be having a baby TODAY!!!

So we quick packed up our bags (thankfully I had laid everything out about a week earlier and made a packing list, etc) and headed to the hospital. Sure enough, they confirmed we would indeed be having a baby that day, but I was not feeling any contractions. They hooked me up to a machine to measure my contractions and told me I was having them every 2-10 minutes. Since I couldn't feel them they think I had been contracting for awhile and just didn't know it.

We settled into our room and tried to sleep but I was way to anxious. For almost 8 hours I laid in bed waiting for real labor to start and to start really feeling my contractions. No such luck. Since I wasn't progressing they decided to start a pitocin drip to kick my contractions into gear. I was really worried about this. I knew the pitocin will make contractions stronger and closer together and I was hoping for an un-medicated birth.

They started the pitocin and slowly increased it. Not comfy. After about 3 hours they checked and I had not made ANY more progress!!! I was SO frustrated. They cranked the pitocin and told me they'd check me in another 4 hours. After about 3 hours I was in so much pain and having contractions one on top of the other. Finally I couldn't take it and I asked for an epidural. I swear I had at least 8 contractions just while they were giving me the epidural and holding still during the contractions while getting the epdiural was nearly impossible. The nurse and Steve had to practically hold me down. Within 10 minutes of having the epidural they checked me and I was fully dilated and had to start pushing!! So, I think actually I made it all the way to the pushing stage without the epidural! I'm pretty proud about that! Pushing was tough - I'll spare the details, but it took me 2 hours to push which the doctor had told us before hand was on the long end.

In the end, the result is that we have an amazing, healthy baby boy!! Since he was born before term, he is considered a premie, but for a 36 weeker he is a pretty big premie - 6lbs 14oz, 19 3/4" long. They estimate if he would have gone full term he could've been 9.5 pounds!! He is so beautiful! He's keeping us busy and life is pretty crazy and exhausting right now, but neither Steve nor I can stop staring at and sunggling with our beautiful son!!! We are so looking forward to our life together as a family :)