I have been seriously remiss in blogging for quite some time, but most particularly these last two months. Between caring for my two under two, being matron of honor in my sister-in-law's wedding in Dallas, and celebrating Christmas, this blog just kind of fell by the wayside. There are a million things I've wanted to tell you all. I still take pictures with the intent of posting them here. Things happen and I still say to myself, "I should blog about that." And yet I haven't. So, I'm going to play catch-up in the next few weeks. And I'm going to start with the most momentous thing to happen in the past three months that I never got to share; the birth of my second baby boy.
I was scheduled to be admitted into the hospital to begin the induction process at 9 PM Tuesday, 5 days before my due date. However, because it is difficult for the Labor and Delivery Unit to predict how many beds will be available for voluntary inductions, I had to wait until they called me to come in. This didn't happen until 11 PM. I figured since I'd preregistered and they knew I was coming that things would move quickly once I got there. Au contraire!!! I didn't finish getting checked-in and prepped until nearly 1. It is mind-boggling how slowly things happen in a hospital when it's not an emergency. I had a nice, but seemingly incompetent nurse. She spent nearly an hour trying to put in an IV. She sat next to me prodding my arms and hands for like, 20 minutes before she made her first try (because, yes, there was more than one). She jabbed and poked around in my arm for what seemed like forever. Ouch. She thought she got it in the vein so she opened up the IV. Jamie and I watched with horror as my wrist filled with fluid and quickly swelled to about twice its normal size. She turned off the IV and pulled it out, telling me "Oh, that will go back down quickly." It actually took two days and left me bruised. Liar. She then went to my OTHER arm to have another go at it. I looked at Jamie with eyes the size of saucers, silently expressing my fear that she would ALSO screw up THIS arm leaving me with nowhere comfortable for an IV. I also worried that perhaps this nurse was indicative of the quality of care I could expect at this hospital. Thankfully she managed to get a vein the second time though and she turned out to be the only person I encountered during my stay who sucked at her job. However, her screw up haunted me throughout the entire labor experience because every time the blood pressure cuff tightened on that arm (which was every fifteen minutes!) I thought my wrist might literally split open. I told my mom (a nurse) about the whole fiasco when she arrived at the hospital the next afternoon. She told me, "Mary, you're a 30 year old pregnant woman. Your veins are the size of hoses. And if she was having a hard time, she should have had someone else do your IV." Amen, mother. Next time if my nurse complains about my veins, I'm asking for a new one. I don't care if I hurt her feelings. All being nice and patient got me was a swollen ouchie wrist. Anyway, so that was literally the worst part of the whole thing. Getting my IV. How dumb.
So, I had a mechanical induction which is where they insert a little balloon and fill it with fluid so that it pushes on your cervix causing you to dilate to about 3 cm. At that point it falls out and they start you on pitocin to get you contracting. The idea was to have the balloon in overnight while I slept and start the pitocin in the morning. The whole thing was very uncomfortable and between that and my swollen wrist, I didn't get any sleep that night. So much for that idea. I was already dilated to 2 cm when they started. Do you know how much I was dilated when it was over? Between 2 and 3 cm. Do I feel that it was worth it? NO! I'm not sure I would consider that result to mean it even actually WORKED. Psh. Anyway, so they start pitocin in my IV at around 7 in the morning and I began contracting. Not bad and not really all that regularly. But, you know, I kind of knew how it would go down and I didn't really expect anything to start happening until they broke my water. That's what happened with Will. I got the epidural, they broke my water, and I delivered 2 hours later. So, around noon I got my epidural (even though I hadn't really progressed past 3 cm) and the doctor broke my water. My epidural was AWESOME this time, by the way. I didn't feel ANYTHING. HEAVEN. I was fully dilated and ready to push three hours later.
I felt the urge to push despite the epidural and the doctor finally came in to see about things. I was fully dilated and ready to go. He told the nurse to have me practice pushing and he'd be back. Thankfully the nurse fussed at him to sit and wait for just a minute. It's a good thing he listened. I pushed once and he hopped to attention. Before he let me push any more he explained that, because this was a big baby, I really had to listen and do what he told me to in order to keep from hurting myself. I was all about NOT hurting myself, so I was all ears. And thanks to the epidural which dulled sensation and thus helped me maintain control, I was able to do as he instructed. Actually, I couldn't even feel my contractions and they weren't showing up on the monitor, so he had to tell me when to push anyway. It was so controlled. I felt so safe. Jamie was standing beside me, supporting my neck and urging me on. My parents were standing next to him, watching in awe as their second grandson entered the world. It was perfect. Little Jake was born in about three pushes, 10 minutes later. It was like, EASY. I felt nothing but joy. The doctor had me reach down and pull Jake up onto my stomach and I started sobbing immediately, suddenly a mother of two. I could hear my parents' happy, excited voices telling me how beautiful he was, that he looked like Will, that I did a good job. The room was just so full of love. I couldn't have asked for a more perfect entrance into the world for my baby boy.
I spent the next half hour working on getting him to latch for the first time. He was slow to figure it out compared to his brother, who'd had a vacuum seal on my boob within seconds. But he turned out to be a much more gentle nurser, which made breastfeeding enjoyable and downright easy right from the start, without ANY of the pain and injury I experienced last time (however this time breastfeeding did cause some toe-curling contractions for the first few days). Jake had a heel stick in the room soon after birth so the nurse could test his blood sugar, something that is standard procedure for the hospital when babies top 9 lbs. since big babies are often the result of a diabetic mother. He was fine however. So I got to spend an hour with my little guy before he was taken away for his first bath. Jamie went with him, though he had to watch through the nursery window. In the meantime my parents went back to our house to releave my friend Cristin, who graciously watched Will so they could be at the birth. I was transferred to a Mother and Baby room where Jake and I would spend the next two days.
Everything has just been so much easier this time. I'm not sure if they are easier because I'm more laid back, or if I'm laid back because they are easier. But it's nice, either way. It's so nice, in fact, that I've been thinking about a third baby pretty much since the moment we left the hospital. I know that's ridiculous and I need to just enjoy my new little guy. But seriously, how could I NOT want to experience something so miraculous and beautiful again?! Especially when the result is so awesome! How could I not want another one of these guys?
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