It's a...

Our baby finally arrived on July 7th at 1:17 pm. He was 8 lbs. 7 oz and 21 inches. That's right, I said "He". We had a boy! His name is James Dexter.

Since I was more than a week overdue, the doctor told me the Friday before to plan on being induced Wednesday morning since the hospital was already booked for Tuesday night. I hadn't heard anything from the doctor's office by Tuesday morning so I called to double check to make sure everything was still on track. I was told to call the hospital, so I did. Good thing I double checked because the hospital had me scheduled to come in that night! I went into work for a while to wrap everything up, came home and put together my last minute things, picked up dinner, took Bentley to my parents house (they kindly agreed to keep him company while we stayed at the hospital), and went to the hospital.

I checked in just after 9 pm and they showed me to my room. I got all set up and changed into my pretty gown and sat and waited. Several different nurses came in and out, but no one really gave me details as to what was going on. They did however, manage to get me set up on an IV. At first the nurse tried my right wrist, but that didn't work. Then she tried the top of my right hand. That didn't work either, but apparently my vein wanted to prove that it was in fact working and I bled everywhere. I hadn't ever really seen my hand do that before. Next, the nurse told me she could only poke me twice and then someone else had to try. The second nurse came in and tried my left forearm. At last, it took. She then filled up some tubes for blood work. Once she removed the last tube, blood went everywhere. I honestly have never known myself to bleed so much. Austin was surprised too. I think the nurse was even a little nervous about all the bleeding and I didn't understand why until I saw my sheet. I had been averting my eyes up until that point. Good thing I hadn't been watching the whole time! After I was done being used as a pin cushion, I was then hooked up to the fetal monitors and blood pressure machine. At last I was set and could gear myself up for the night ahead. I just hoped what I had gone through with the IV wasn't an indication of what was to come.

Finally, a third nurse came in and explained that they had just had 2 deliveries and everyone was pretty busy. However, she gave us a packet of papers and explained what to expect and was great at answering our questions. Eventually I was assigned a nurse and around midnight they gave me some medication to soften my cervix. At that point I was at a 2 and 70% effaced. I was told to get a good night's sleep because tomorrow would be a big day. The nurse also informed me that she would be checking on me every so often and try to sleep through it. Ha! That's a good one!!

After hours of restless sleep, I was very much awake after my water broke at 5:45 am, fifteen minutes before they were going to start the pitocin to induce me. I was so happy the baby decided to come on its own and it was very convenient to already be at the hospital. I toughed it as long as I could before asking for an epidural around 8 am. I was very nervous about getting one, but figured it was worth having a good experience. I'm so glad I did! That was way less of an ordeal than having the IV put in the night before and lessened my discomfort immensely. After my water broke I progressed fairly quickly. I started pushing around 12:30 pm and James was born about 45 minutes later. It was so much fun to anticipate the gender of our baby until the very end. James has already brought us so much joy and I'm looking forward to all the fun the future will bring!