When James was born, we couldn't believe how smoothly his birth went. I was induced on my due date, so we showed up at 6:00 that morning, and had a baby by 1:00 that afternoon. Eliza was not much different, except that I went into labor on my own. We showed up at the hospital around 5:00 PM, and had a baby 2 hours later. We hoped this birth experience would be similar, and we weren't disappointed!
I was supposed to have a doctor appointment Wednesday, December 30, but when we got there we were told that my doctor had to do an emergency surgery, so we would have to reschedule for the next day. I was a little disappointed, because I had been having lots of contractions and I wanted to see if any progress had been made. But we went home and waited to see the doctor Thursday morning. They took my blood pressure soon after we arrived and it was pretty high, but they weren't overly concerned; they would just check it again before I left. We saw the doctor, who confirmed that I had made some progress. We talked about scheduling an induction for the next week in case I had not gone into labor by then. I mentioned my blood pressure and how I had been induced with my first baby because of it, and the doctor left to look at the schedule. It was New Year's Eve, so things were a little different than normal, I think. He came back and said, "Let's go ahead and induce you this afternoon." Okay! My doctor would not be able to attend the delivery, but I was okay with that. I got his wife's doctor instead!
We went straight to the hospital and arrived there around noon. (We had packed just in case, and the kids were already at my parents' house for the doctor appointment.) The doctor broke my water, and they started Pitocin to get the contractions going. I managed to handle the pain until about 3:30 or so, when I asked for an epidural. It was wonderful! After that, I almost went to sleep. They didn't check my progress again until sometime after 5:00PM, and the nurse said, "You are ready to have a baby!" They got the doctor in pretty quickly, and after 3 rounds of pushing, Brian was born at 5:54! Nearly my whole family was in the waiting room, and they got to come in and meet him right after he was born. It was great!
After the delivery, my blood pressure remained high for a while. It went down a little during the night, but was back up again the next day, so they told me to stay lying down on my left side. That was very frustrating! I wanted to be up and about, because I felt pretty good, but I had to stay in the bed as much as possible. It finally started staying at a fairly normal level (still high, but not as bad), so they were not concerned enough to keep me there longer than planned, and we went home Saturday morning. I guess it was a good thing we went ahead and had the baby…it could have turned into something really bad if we had waited!
We are having a great time at home with our newly expanded family! The kids have been out of school, so they have had the chance to get to know their new brother. They start back tomorrow, but Jay will be home for another week and a half, so that will help. It has been a great start to a New Year! I hope you are having a blessed New Year as well!
