Our second son, Nathaniel Benjamin, was born one week ago. Here is our birth story, some pictures from his first week and a link to more pictures on Shutterfly.
I was scheduled for a repeat c section on Monday, the 14th, at 12:30. Mom and Karyn came in the weekend prior, ready to take care of Simon while Matt and I were in the hospital. I woke up on Saturday morning feeling a little off...and started having contractions that afternoon. They were definitely more intense and painful than the Braxton-Hicks contractions I've been having for much of my pregnancy, but because they weren't coming consistently, I figured it was false labor. They did get to about 5 minutes apart, so I gave Mom and Karyn a call to let them know we might need them earlier than expected.
The contractions spread out but continued without stopping overnight...needless to say, I was only able to doze for 5-10 minutes between contractions before giving up and getting up at 3:30 ish to deal with the pain. By Sunday morning, I was convinced I was in true labor, called Mom and Karyn and they came over around 6am ready to watch Simon. We packed up the car, but I still wasn't sure it was for real and we waited a bit longer...and the contractions spread back out. We spent Sunday hanging around the house, me dealing with labor and feeling generally terrible. Another sleepless night later, we said a teary goodbye to Simon and headed to the hospital for the scheduled c-section.
When we got there, they checked me and it turns out that I was in labor, and I was 5 cm dilated and completely effaced! The baby's head hadn't dropped at all, which was a slight concern, but there was every reason to believe my body was ready to have the baby on its own. After talking to my OB, I decided to give it a few hours to see if this was going to continue progressing or if we needed to do the c section after all. So we skipped the scheduled c section, got me an epidural (which took the anesthesiologist 4 tried to get right, grrrr) and settled in for a while.
The next 7 hours or so went quickly. Mom and Karyn brought Simon by to visit, which was great....I had one scare when my blood pressure dropped really low and they had to give me oxygen and ephedrine to get it back up. And we remained hopeful that with the pitocin I was getting and after having my water broken, I was making more progress.
But when my OB checked me at 5:30PM...I had made no progress whatsoever. And the baby's head hadn't dropped any further. So while we hoped for a bit to avoid the c section, it just wasn't in the cards. At 6:10, we headed to the OR.
The surgery took a little longer than the first one, but it went smoothly and Nathaniel Benjamin was born at 6:43 PM! He weighed 7lbs 11oz and was 20 1/2 inches long (although the nurse recorded it wrong on all his records as 21 1/2"...) He was healthy and screaming and after being cleaned up, they handed him to Matt and we all headed back to the room.
We spent the next 48 hours in the hospital, and Simon was able to come by the next day and meet his new baby brother.We have been home since last Wednesday and other than the conplete lack of sleep, we are doing well! Simon is very interested in Nate, and always wants to know where "Baby Brother" is. He likes to hold him and give kisses and hugs, which is wonderful. He also had a lot of fun with "Glama" and Aunt Karyn while we were gone. Nate is a sweet baby, he is a champion nurser and loves being held and cuddled.
Overall, we are thrilled to have Nathaniel here and become a family of four. We are excited for Christmas with the boys, and I will be home until Mid-March, which I'm looking forward to.
Here are some pictures from the first week, and here is a link to a bunch more.
Welcome Nathaniel, we love you!
Funny observation: apparently hairdryers were a reliable means of entertaining Simon while we were in the hospital...
