On May 4 at 4:24 am Henry entered the world!
The second he was born he started to cry and everything about him was perfect. He weighed 7lbs 13 oz and was 20 inches. He was born with dark brown hair, and we still can't tell if his eyes are blue or brown. My mother's intuition was mainly correct--if you recall the last blog post I thought that he would be born the next day--he wasn't born that day, but I did go into labour that day!
In the afternoon/early evening of may 3, I felt like I was having mild contractions, but it had happened the day before as well, which had turned out to be nothing. I decided to believe it was nothing and carried on with my day. It was actually a really great day...took the girls to the park by our new house (I'll post some pictures in another post as they are cute), and went out for Vietnamese food. Looking back it was a great way to spend our last day as a family of 4. Anyway, I was tired and went to bed around 9:30. As I was lying down I felt really uncomfortable and eventually got up and went into the baby room and sat in the chair hoping to discern some sort of pattern from the contractions. They actually seemed to be 25-30 mins apart. I tried to rest and contacted our doula Michelle who told me to drink water and try to sleep. I had woken Mike up to inform him but told him to go back to sleep as well. It wasn't too comfortable to lie in bed so I waited in the family room for a while until Mike came out, and we decided we'd better inform Auntie Amanda, who would have to come and stay with the girls over night. She arrived at 12:30ish I think. When she got to the house the contractions were maybe 5 minutes apart and getting very annoying but not horrendous. We all hung out in the living room as they got worse. The baby was starting to move around a lot with every contraction and I kept feeling the urge to pee all the time even though i didn't really have to. Around 2:00 I had a super bad contraction and decided we needed assistance, so Michelle came over right away. At this point I was saying things like "this isn't fun", and trying various positions to get comfortable and deal with the pain, but really was just flailing all over the place, unable to do anything of any use. The difference when Michelle arrived was amazing. She got me to calm down with each contraction, breath, and relax my whole body. Way easier to deal with the pain when relaxed as opposed to tense and freaking out. She wanted me to try new positions and suggested I get in the bath to relax but I felt like things were progressing rapidly. She told me to tell her when it was time to go to the hospital and around 3:00am I decided it was time. She told me to focus on a spot in the car with each contraction and breath through it. It was definitely a way worse drive than the other 2 labours, as I was much further along. Mike did a great job of driving carefully!
When we arrived at the hospital the 3 of us made our way in which was really really difficult. I was so reluctant to get out of the car as I knew that I would probably have lots of contractions just walking into the hospital. When the nurses met us in the hall I remember saying "I am very much in labour", at which point another contraction came on. I'm so glad that I looked like I was far along as they didn't even take me into the triage room to be checked out, and just admitted me right to the room. I believe we got to the hospital at 3:20. Mike had to go off to give them my health card, and in the meantime they checked me out--8-9cm she said! I was so sure they'd say 4-5 cm (that was what i thought in my head), that I had a good cry. Could not believe I'd made it so far without medication and that the end was so close! It's funny because leading up to the day I was so unsure as to whether I'd be able to get through the labour without the epidural, since I'd had it both times before and knew what a relatively pain free child birth was like. They asked me after they examined me if I wanted anything for the pain and when I said no I'd never been so sure of anything before. I knew I could do it...I figured that to get me into the world my mom, and her mom, and her mom forever and ever had never had an epidural. I felt like it was a rite of passage for me in a way. I'm not saying there is anything wrong with epidurals or c-sections, or any of these other things that happen in labour, but as it was our third and last child I made it my mission to have this experience. I'm not going to lie, the whole thing was the worst pain I have ever endured. It only got worse and worse and worse and when it was time for that final push, they told me to wait as the doctor was putting on his gloves. I needed that baby out right away and I was sure there was not enough time to get the gloves on. It's amazing how when you can actually feel that the baby is right there ready to come out how much harder you can push. I now know why Rose was vacuumed out, as I wasn't pushing nearly hard enough. There was a definite desperation with this one. As much as I could feel all of the pain I was surprised when he actually was born. I didn't even know that it was happening, and was shocked that I actually did it.
So the whole labour--the painful part which i think of as the labour, was about 4 hours long...and the really painful part was only around 2.5 hours long. Pretty good if you ask me.
After he was born, they let him lie on me right away for a really long time. He had a couple of poos on my stomach which was fun. After a while of lying there he started the rooting reflex so it was time to try to feed him. He took to nursing fairly easily which was a relief. Michelle gave me some water and a snack from her bag, and made sure we were all doing well and then went home. I'm so so grateful to have had her there as she made all the difference in the world.
After that I had a quick breakfast snack and we went to our room. The plan was to stay the night (as the OBGYN said I should stay till the following morning, but I felt well enough to attempt to go home later that day. There is just no sleeping when you're sharing a room with someone and their snoring husband. Even though we'd have the kids at home and that would make things challenging with me being a little slow, it ensured I'd get some sort of sleep. So as the time was 6:00am ish when we got to our room and there was no hope of sleep, mike eventually went to the car to try to get a quick 1/2 hour nap while I fed Henry. Then we tried to switch off after that so I could have a rest. No sleep was had but lying down and closing my eyes felt pretty good. We had no choice really but to be awake. There were people in and out of the room all morning and lots of noise. Henry was fairly quiet sleeping in our arms. We had a few visitors--grandma and grandpa came first. Easy to get there as grandma was already in the hospital. My dad just wheeled her on in. Later when Amanda and James came with the girls at the same time as grandma and grandpa returned from being away I said "oh look everyone's rolling in". "Literally" mike says. But the best line of the day came from James who commented on Henry's May 4th birthday--"May the fourth be with you Henry", he said.
The girls were happy to be having fun with auntie Amanda and uncle James. They were interested to see us and their new brother but were also excited about the trip that was planned to Yogurty's afterwards. Obviously it would take time for it all to sink in. Rose was even a bit scared of Henry. I think because he was so small. Closer to when we were going to leave we also had a visit from Uncle Greg.
At some point around lunch, the nurse said we could be discharged in the afternoon after being seen by an OB and pediatrician. It only meant we'd have to return for Henry's 24hour tests the next day. Still better to go home I figured. Before we left, Henry was given a bath by tue same nurse that bathed the girls. Weird. No one had to check my blood pressure constantly or change IV's since i didnt have an epidural. The OB on call ok'd me to go and the pediatrician ok'd Henry to go. I believe it was around 4:00 when we busted out of there. It was a good feeling walking out of there. Although I was ridiculously stiff, I remembered our 3:20am entrance which was not fun. Henry was driven home in Daddy's Audi and greeted by all the neighbors who were enjoying the nice day outside. Really the rest of that day is a blur. The girls were home and got to check out their little brother. We ate dinner of some sort and called it a night...or whatever you can call it with a 1.5 day old!
