Baby Adalee

Well she is here!  She even came 4 days early, which was much appreciated by both Brock and I.  Here are the details:

Sunday December 4 - 11:33 PM:
My water broke.  I was sleeping when it happened and I woke Brock up and told him that I thought my water was breaking and then I ran to the bathroom.  He sat in bed a little bit shocked and I sat in the bathroom extremely shocked and not sure if I was ready or not.  We made it to the hospital around 12:30 and they gowned me up.  It's hard to believe I was that big.

The next 16 hours were the longest hours of my life.  The nurse checked me to make sure that my water had broken and at first she couldn't get the strip to read that my water had broken.  Well I had a high leak so it hadn't broken all the way.  I did really well with the contractions at first.  I walked around, sat in the Jacuzzi and we watched Polar Express.  I was able to relax through them and they weren't super super painful.  They kept checking me every two hours and I would dilate one more centimeter so I was progressing at least.  Keep in mind this was all happening in the middle of the night and I did not get a chance to sleep at all the entire night.  At one point when the nurse checked me she accidentally broke my water the rest of the way.  After that contractions became very painful.  On Monday around 12 PM ish I think (I didn't keep track and I honestly don't remember so that's a guess) I had to get out of the jacuzzi so that they could check me and monitor the baby for a little bit.  Well I was dilated to a 5+ which was good but the babies heart rate would drop with each contraction so they were worried that the baby had the cord around the neck.  From then on out I became bedridden because they wanted to keep monitoring the baby.  I could not get up and move around and the contractions had become excruciatingly painful.  I had completely forgotten all of the relaxation techniques I had planned to use and after a few hours of pain and I begged for the epidural. :P  I really wasn't going to get it but I was so exhausted because I was running on less than 2 hours of sleep and I could not think to relax so I decided to go ahead and let my body rest.

After the epidural I dilated fairly quickly and I was able to rest.  They put me on an IV and on oxygen and then they also had to insert a catheter into my uterus to put water back up in there in case the cord was wrapped around the babies neck.  Around 2 PM I was fully dilated and getting ready to start the pushing phase.  During transition I still got sick and threw up.  That was no fun considering I had no energy anyways.  The nurse told us that I probably wouldn't have to push much though because she was so low.  Well that turned out to be wrong.  It ended up taking 2 and half hours to push that little baby girl into the world.  She was born at 4:39 PM and weighed 7 lbs 6 oz and was 19 inches long.

Unfortunately she swallowed meconium and as soon as Brock cut the cord they had to get it all out of her tummy before I could hold her.  I was exhausted and just to make me more tired I threw up again.  It really was a magical experience seeing her be born but I have to admit that I don't want to go through labor again any time soon.  :)  But now we have this beautiful baby girl and she is healthy and happy and we are loving her so much.  She is our best Christmas present.

We love you Adalee!