2 week check-up

I took Adalyn in for her two week check up and these are her stats.

At Birth she weighed 7 lbs 5 ozs and was 19 inches long.
At her 2 week check-up she was 8 lbs 4 ozs and 20 1/2 inches long.

She is such an amazing eater. She feeds every hour and a half which makes for a very tired mama. She still sleeps lots. I love having her in our home. The kids just adore her. Thank goodness for all the hands that want to help hold her. Otherwise, I am not sure how I would get anything done. I love having her sleep with me, which I know and have learned from past children that is not such a good idea. I just figure I will stop when she is a few months old. I feel safer knowing she is right next to me.
This has been so much work but I LOVE being her mother. I feel so blessed that Heavenly Father has given me the opportunity to take care of her.

The Birth story part 2 (part 1 below)

After running around trying to throw a bag together, we left for the hospital at 10:30. The contractions started to come a little more regular but they were still mild. Jonathan stopped at the gas station to load up on goodies for him and I. I guess I was still in denial because I was in no hurry to get to the hospital. I just really wanted to go home, get in bed and have a good night sleep.

We get to the hospital and I got out of the car. When I stood up it felt like Niagara falls had just let loose. I was soaked. How could there be anymore amniotic fluid? So, I embarrassingly sloshed my way into the Womans center. Thank goodness there were no elevators to go up.

When I went into the center, she asked me if I was sure my water had broken. I just sort of laughed. I told her yes that I was sure. She preceded to ask me a ton of questions because I didn't preregister. I was sort of annoyed at this point but answered all the questions.

Finally, I get to my room and I promptly handed them my birth plan, things that I wanted and did not want. Now, I hadn't written it out when my water broke. I had it all in my head. Remember I thought that I had time for all of this later. So, on the way to the hospital, I wrote out my birth plan. It consisted of things like I wanted to go completely natural. I did not want pitocin. I wanted to be able to walk around. I wanted them to wait until the umbilical cord stops pulsating before it was cut and I wanted to be able to hold the baby right after she is born and nurse her. This proved to be very invaluable later.

So, they still had to give me an i.v. that they put a heploc on. I still had to be hooked up to a monitor so they could monitor my contractions and the baby's heartbeat. But, this was all portable so that I could walk around. It proved to be very annoying because I had to push a stupid pole around but atleast I was not confined to a bed. Now it was just the waiting game. When I got to the hospital, I was dilated to 2 cm and 65 percent effaced. Haylee's labor was only 4 hours so Jonathan and I said lets have this baby by 3 in the morning. That was 4 hours. I thought I can do that. Well, the problem was my contractions were pretty weak and erratic. They were painful enough that I couldn't sleep. So, I walked and walked and walked. As long as I stayed moving they would stay consistent. If I laid down they would become erratic. I tried the Jacuzzi tub and it helped with the back pain but it also slowed the contractions down. So, I just walked. I watched the hours just tick by. I had her come check me again at 4 am. There was no progress. I was patient and thought, it's okay. I really tried to stay positive. I was exhausted already but knew I could still do this.

At 8 am my midwife came and checked me. I was at a 3 and still only 65 percent effaced. At this time she was worried that I wasn't making progress and that my contractions were not strong enough. Because my water had broken, we needed to do something more. So, she suggested pitocin. At that time, I was really wanting to progress. So, I agreed to the lowest amount. Well, that really got things started.
My contractions really picked up in intensity and frequency. They were coming every minute and lasting 30 seconds. So, I walked some more. I also did the birthing ball which was the best thing for back pain. I liked this best as it took pressure off of my pelvic area and I was able to rest a bit. At 10:00 I was at a 4 and 75 percent effaced. This was so frustrating for me. I felt like I was progressing so slow. At this time the contractions were very intense. It was getting harder and harder for me to relax and remember the methods I learned to help with labor. I was having a very hard time remembering to breathe and relax. Jonathan was so great though. He would constantly remind me to breathe. My midwife was also amazing. She would push on pressure points which helped relieve some of the pain of the contractions. I was truly amazed by the help she gave me. She was with me from 10:00 until I had the baby, helping me through the most difficult part of labor.

By noon I had only gotten to a five. I literally felt like I was losing my mind. I didn't know if I could do it anymore. The pain was the worst thing I have ever felt in my life. I became that woman that I thought I would never become. It was the worst thing to feel so out of control. At 12:30, I was begging for an epidural. They checked me than and I was at a 7. I didn't care. I WANTED AN EPIDURAL NOW!!! By the time the anesthesiologist got there I was dilated to a 9 and my body just took over. It was the craziest feeling. I had the strongest urge to PUSH! I had to get the baby out now! That is what I was yelling. But, I still wasn't at a ten. I still demanded the epidural. So, at 1:00 I got the epidural and he put one dose of numbing medicine through the tube. At 1:16 she was born. I think I got enough numbing to help with the pushing but I still felt everything!

I was disappointed with myself that I just did not hang on another 15 minutes. I almost did it. But, I can say that looking back the only thing I would have changed was hanging on another 15 minutes. I would do natural again. It was amazing to see how alert Adalyn was when she came out. She was completely different than any of my other babies at birth. She stayed that way for quite awhile. It was all worth it to me to see her not having any effects from the medication.

I will never tell another woman what is the best way to labor. It is by far the hardest thing I have ever gone through. This labor was far from what I thought it would be. I guess my only advice is have no expectations on how it will be and you will not be disappointed..

The Birth Story Part 1

It has taken me awhile to write this mainly because I was unsure if I wanted to share it. The reason for this is that I know quite a few pregnant ladies right now and did not want to influence them one way or the other with this story. This is just my experience and know that it will be different for every other pregnant woman out there, just like this birth story was completely different from my other four.

It all started in the late afternoon of the 22nd. I was having some braxton hicks contractions that were not going away with lying down or changing positions or any of that. But, they were very erratic. Sometimes they were 15 minutes apart and sometimes they were 3 minutes apart. They were not painful just annoying. I didn't say anything to Jonathan about them. I made dinner and was just going about my regular duties. Jonathan had church meetings that night and so I went and relaxed in my bedroom for a bit. They started getting a bit stronger but still no pattern to them. I really thought it was all false labor. I mean I still had 18 days to go. My two oldest had been gone that whole week on trek. They were to return around 9:30.
Jonathan had gotten home from his meetings about 9:00. I than decided to let him know that I was having some very irregular contractions. I told him not to worry it had to be false labor. My kids returned around 10:00. As I was listening to them speak of their adventures, I started having some mildly painful contractions. They were painful enough that I needed to concentrate on them and block others out. But, I still had 18 days to go. I kept telling myself it was false labor. I did not have any type of bags packed. I hadn't even preregistered at the hospital. I was going to do that on Monday at my next doctors appointment. So, I convincingly told myself that it was false and went and laid down.
As I was laying there I felt like I had just uncontrollably wet my pants. I have a very strong bladder so knew that it was something more. I stood up and called Jonathan in the room. I told him that I thought my water had just broken. But, I was unsure because it had never happened to me before. So, I started walking into the bathroom and well lets just say that I than became very sure that my water had broken. I started to panic. I wasn't ready for this. I still had a few weeks to mentally prepare for this. My babies had never been more than 5 days early. I than started to cry... I don't know why. I guess it was because the reality of the situation hit me. There was no turning back now.
I called my midwife to let her know that my water had broken and that I wanted to stay at home for as long as I can. She told me that I needed to go and get checked to make sure everything was okay. I wasn't really very happy about that because I knew they would make me stay. In hindsight, I wish I would have followed my own instincts and stayed home for awhile.


To be continued....