Since we are rapidly coming up on Edmund's TWO month birthday, I figured it was high time to catch my internet friends and family who are NOT on Facebook or Crossings up on the birth and what's been going on since!! I will probably need to break it up into several posts though...starting with the actual birth story.
In the wee hours of the morning on July 13th...my water broke!! After a quick checkup by my midwife I went back to bed for a bit, then got up for the day and straightened up the house. I laid back down in the afternoon for a while, my mom arrived, we ate Sonic cheeseburgers and visited...all the while I was having sporadic contractions. My midwife came and did another checkup that evening...and recommended some Benadryl and sleep, as I wasn't progressing much.
I took the Benadryl and lay down..and within the hour things started picking up!! By 10:30pm I was having regular contractions just a few minutes apart...so we called my midwife back. The midwives arrived, and so the night began!! It all runs together for me...but it was a LONG night. Come morning, my midwife expressed her concern that my blood pressure was too elevated for where I was at as far as dilation...and she recommended that I be transported to a hospital.
We got to the hospital and I got settled in a room. I was still having regular contractions just 2-3 minutes apart...but not progressing much at all. They finally gave me an epidural just after noon so that I at least could get some rest. I did get some rest that afternoon, but still hadn't progressed that last centimeter needed and by 5:30pm the doctor brought up the possibility of a C-section if I hadn't progressed further by 9pm.
When the doctor came back to check me just before 9pm I had finally progressed to 10 centimeters and got the go ahead to start pushing...hallelujah!! I started pushing just after 9pm and almost two hours later...at 10:58pm...Edmund made his appearance!! He was 8lbs. 7oz...and 21 inches long...and cute, of course!! Brack even cut the cord...even though all along he'd said he wouldn't!! He was so sweet and encouraging to me through all this, even though I know he was tired and freaked out by the whole thing (the birthing process itself, plus the complications).
After things settled down and I got into a room and we'd gotten a few hours of rest we found out that since it had been so long between my water breaking and Edmund's birth that his white blood cell count was elevated and the pediatrician wanted him to go on 48 hours of antibiotics there in the hospital. So we decided to stay till the course of antibiotics was done and mother and baby could leave the hospital together!! That Friday (July 17th) in the afternoon we finally got to go home. My mom stayed with us through all of this, staying up at night with us so that we could have the baby in the room except when he was getting his treatments. She stayed with us and helped me out till that Sunday night and then she headed home. My sister Susanna came in to replace mom for a day before heading off to teach in English camps in Taiwan...and then I was gonna be on my own with the little guy after that...since Brack was back at work!!
But things came up to change all that. I'll explain in my next post...
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