Birthday: August 21, 2009Time: 6:49 a.m. MST
Weight: 7 lbs 11 oz
Length: 20 3/4"
Location: Denver, CO
With some gentle encouragement from several friends, I am finally updating our baby blog. It is my intent to do a better job now that I have a beautiful baby boy to show off. I believe I will have endless content with the new adventures we are now beginning.
So far our first month has been a whirlwind of learning, changing, and lots of love- accompanied by many, many diapers, bottles, loads of laundry and sleepless nights.
To begin, I will recap our birth story.
On the morning of August 20th I was sitting in the training room of Re/Max international in DTC learning how to better sell bank owned homes. Around 10 a.m. I realized that the crampiness I was feeling had to be the start of labor contractions. By the time the class was over and I politely excused myself from the company of fellow colleagues and headed home as I had no doubt that what I was experiencing was, in fact, real contractions. Always trying to squeeze one more thing in, I contemplated proceeding with my errand of exchanging cameras at Best Buy. Between contractions I was sure that I could handle this tiny errand, but each time another contraction came along I would decide to head straight home instead- which, thankfully, is what I ultimately did.
Around 1:30 p.m. Eric and I found ourselves at Rose Hospital checked into the Labor and Delivery Triage walking the halls and hoping that they would not be sending us home. Somewhere around 3:30 p.m. I was checked into a Labor and Delivery room and was really looking forward to the jacuzzi tub to help relieve the contractions before the epidural. Eric ran the tub for me and due to complications starting my IV and the contractions becoming too strong I vetoed the tub and went ahead with the epidural around 5 p.m. I'm really foggy on what occured during all these hours but around 10 p.m. the nurse broke my water.
Meanwhile, back in Louisiana- Ginny, Eric's mom, was frantically changing flights, nervously packing and rushing to get to Denver - pronto. She was determined to be here for the birth of her grandson who had decided to make his arrival 2 weeks early. Ginny, now more commonly known as Nana, arrived at Rose Hospital by way of plane, dud shuttle and taxi around 1 a.m. Still more than 5 hours before baby's arrival.
Around 5 a.m. my doctor and the L & D nurses were advising me that we should proceed with a c-section because baby boy Hooper's head was wedged in my pelvis and was starting to swell. The nurse upped my petocin dosage and gave me one more hour to see if we would make any progress. At only 5 cm dialated and 17+ hours of labor (13 with epidural) we were rolled into the OR. All I really remember was being horrified that my son's head was swelling, seeing the nurse seemingly toss bright blue scrubs at Eric and hearing Ginny yell out farewell down the hall. I'm pretty sure the whole floor heard her! That was the first time I realized she wasn't coming with us. The c-section was an expierence I'll only share with those who ask, so we'll just skip ahead to Evan's arrival at 6:49 a.m.
It was apparent to everyone in the room except me that Evan had officially made his debut. He took a moment to let out a cry that I was much anticipating, but now hardly remember. What I do vividly remember though was all of the doctors and nurses exclaiming how much red hair he had and asking us if we had red heads in the family (which Eric does). Of course, I'm not imagining pretty red hair like Aunt Tonya- I'm imagining Carrot Top red hair and thinking to myself that they must be wrong. Of course, all I can see is a huge blue paper sheet and the florescent lights of the OR and all I hear is the ooohing and ahhing over our newborn red head son. Eric's very comical reaction was, "He better not have red hair!" Finally, after what seemed like forever, my beautiful son was presented to me all bundled in a hospital issued blue and pink striped swaddling blanket. I remember his beautiful blue eyes (no surprise) and his head full of hair was actually more of a beautiful apricot color. He was quickly taken away from me and off went Eric and maybe "Evan" while I was put back together again.
The rest of that day and much of the following is a complete blurr to me. I should have Eric write something about those two days because he did most of the changing and feeding. Even though I was the one taking most of the classes, reading all of the books and making mental notes from friend's experiences, Eric was the one who really took on his new parenting role as a complete natural. He exceeded all of my expectations.
More updates on our adventures to follow soon. For now I must go check on my napping angel, Evan James.
