Sophia's Birth Story

I remember learning in nursing school the importance of a woman rehearsing her birth story after having a baby- and now I understand why. It is like some crazy dream, something so surreal, that you have to go over it again and again to sort it all out. So I promised to post mine awhile ago- so here it is. (I am a nurse and describe things some people might think gross- if that's you, sorry.)

First, I didn't realize I was pregnant until I was almost 8 weeks along. I had been off birth control for a couple of months, and was feeling kind of weird. Rick said - maybe your pregnant! I thought I was about to start my period. So we bought a pregnancy test and tampons at the same time :)

Lo and behold, Rick was right. We were so excited. Turns out our Mexican vacation was more fun than we had thought.

My due date was December 10th, and that day came and went with no baby. Here we were a week and a half later- and I was going pretty crazy. On December 17th (Friday) I got woken up by having contractions around 4am. They were pretty regularly every 15-20 minutes. I was pretty excited and so was Rick. I knew we probably had a while to go, and just was hoping and praying that they were true labor and would continue. So that morning I had Rick stay home with me and we went grocery shopping to see if things progressed. They stayed about the same, and Rick had stuff to do on-campus, so I sent him off. I stayed home and made cookies. Rick told people at work what was going on, and everyone he worked with was like “what are you doing here?! Go home to your wife?!” haha. So Rick came home and we spent the rest of the afternoon together.
That night we decided some walking would be good to help things along. So we went to the huge Mall, and walked for hours, I even climbed the stairs in between levels. I think all in all we walked about 3 miles that night. My contractions would very in intensity, and were anywhere from 5-15 minutes apart. We went in one store and all the workers were gawking at my huge belly and had great sympathy when I told them how over due I was. One of the girls, when I walked in to the store, turned to another co-worker and said “what is wrong with her stomach?!”
Well, we went home and watched A Christmas Story that night and tried to get some sleep. I slept so awfully that night, being woken up all night by contractions. They were definitely more intense, consistently every 5-15 minutes still, but no more than that. So I barely slept at all, and woke up the next day feeling exhausted. That day, Saturday, we kind of hung around the house. Got the hospital bags put together, and I would try to rest as much as I could. My contractions were so much worse when I would lay down. But I would use my breathing/hypnobirthing techniques and get through them. That whole day the contractions continued about the same. I was tired and impatient for things to get a move on. That morning, when I had woken up, I had lost my mucous plug. So I knew we couldn’t be too far off. The day progressed, and we got in to the night time and still the same. We started watching Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back, and got pretty far thorough it, when my mucous discharge started to be bloody and my contractions started to pick up. I started to get really uncomfortable through my contractions and started to have to move around to deal with them. Especially they hurt when I tried to go to the bathroom. By the time Luke was starting to battle Darth Vadar, my contractions we consistently 5 minutes apart. I called the Dr on call and we paused the movie, grabbed the bags and got a move on.
On the way to the hospital my contractions became even more frequent. Every 3-5 minutes. I went to triage, where they checked me and I was dilated to a 5. I was pretty excited- I had waited as long as possible to go in. I was admitted and got a room with a jacuzzi tub. I hopped right in that tub as soon as I could an it really felt great as I breathed through my contractions. We were admitted around 11pm. I sat in the tub, with Rainbow Relaxation playing, while I just breathed. Rick sat near by in the bathroom and studied for his final.
Around 2am the nurse got me out of the tub and checked me again. I was already at 8cm. We were moving fast, and the nurse and Doctor were thinking this baby was coming soon. My whole pregnancy I had had excessively large amounts of amniotic fluid. My water sac was so full that it was bulging through my cervix, like a water balloon. The Dr. recommended that we should break the water to help things move along. Since things were already going so well, it sounded like a good idea and we went ahead with it. It was A LOT of water that came out, and it actually felt incredibly good to relieve that pressure. I continued to breath through my contractions and waited for things to pick up in to the final stages of labor. They rechecked me a bit after that and I was still at 8cm. We kept going, and a few hours later I was still at 8cms. The Dr started to think my water through my cervix had actually been helping me dilate, and now my baby wasn’t engaging down as she should. The Dr started to become concerned that the baby maybe was too big (9-10lbs guess?!) for me, and started to say we might need to consider other options. But the Dr was very patient, and I continued to labor naturally at 8cms for 10 hours.
By that time, I was physically exhausted. I hadn’t slept for 2 nights, and I was losing all ability to focus on breathing through my contractions. We had tried every position to help the baby, but she still wasn’t coming down. And my contractions were starting to lose effectiveness since my uterus was getting so tired to. The Dr said we needed to either try pitocin, or go for a c-section. She said that I was the best hypnobirthing lady she had ever seen, that I had done everything I could, but my body just needed some help. I felt like I agreed, I needed some help. I was a bit an emotional wreck though. My previous visions of how my birth would go had slowly slipped away.
Rick and I said a prayer and thought it over, decided we’d mostly want to avoid a C-section, and decided to start pitocin. I knew that pitocin make contractions much stronger though, and was just so exhausted, that I felt there was no way for me to do that without getting an epidural. So I got an epidural and started the pitocin. The epidural was so weird. It felt like my whole lower body was asleep, like I had been laying with my legs funny for too long. They had to turn me every few hours, and I could barely help. But with the epidural, I no longer felt the contractions and was able to sleep for a few hours. It felt sooo good to just sleep after being so exhausted.
At one point the nurse had to straight cath me, and when she put my head down my blood pressure dropped and I blacked out. They bolused me with fluids and called anesthesia right away. I came to fast, and had no idea what had happened. I guess it isn’t that uncommon with epidurals. We got to around 5pm on Sunday and a new Dr came on shift. Shortly thereafter I started to feel the need to start pushing. The whole idea of ‘breathing down’ my baby was no longer and option with the epidural, so I just followed what the nurse and Dr told me to do. A barrage of people came in the room, and I pushed my baby out with a lot of effort for about 15 minutes. Rick and the nurse held my legs. I was so tired. And then at 6:28pm little girl came out and she was just perfect. They put her on my chest right way and the feeling of that moment is indescribable. To have her there, to be done, to see this little one who had been inside of me for so long. I was bleeding quite a bit, and had to get some stitches. But I could have cared less since I had my little girl.

Like I said, it is all quite surreal. Things didn't go as I had originally planned, but I couldn't be happier with the outcome. And that is the birth story.

Week 2

Okay, playing catch up on the blog here. I am starting to see the light of day between sleep and the never ending feedings. (I have great sympathies for dairy cows now). Here are pictures from last week. My mom came and stayed with us, which was heavenly. She cooked, cleaned, cuddled, and listened to my hormonal crying - she is the best. I can't believe how fast Sophia is already growing- each day she is different and getting more personality. We are figuring each other out still- especially what makes her go to sleep. ANYONE WITH SUGGESTIONS ON HOW TO GET BABIES TO SLEEP BETTER- I AM ALL EARS. Just putting that out there :D

Sophia- 1 week old- meeting her Oma Wolf for the first time.

My little sleepy head. (why don't you do this at night?!) Lucky she's cute and I don't mind.

Sophia in her lamb swing- this is the best invention ever! She loves it and would live in it if she could.

Her other favorite place- in the sling carrier on Daddy. Rick loves carrying her around like this, it's so cute. I am just figuring out how to tie the darn thing.

Rocking away with Oma- I love Sophie's faces. She's so funny to watch, I could stare at her all day (I'm a first timer here, okay!)

I especially love this picture, Sophie and Oma look so quizzical at each other.

This is how I want her to be forever- so cuddly. Mmm, I'm in love.

Hopefully I will post my birth story sometime this week- more picture to come!

Sophia- 1 day old

Life is finally starting to have some small sense of normalcy, but with all the feedings and changings and not-sleeping, we still have a way to go. Here are pictures we took in the hospital when she was about 16 hours old. I can't believe how much she has already changed in 10 days! As hectic as it all may be, we couldn't possibly love anything more. I am taking lots of pictures, hopefully I will find time to post them soon :)

Merry Christmas Baby

Well, it has been a whirlwind this last week. After coming home from the hospital, we had to go right back because Sophia's bilirubin levels were high. But she is all good now, and we are all back home and doing great. She is such a cutie- can't get enough of her. And now, our baby girl's first Christmas.

Sophia Terese Smith 12.19.10

Sophia Terese Smith was born 12.19.2010 at 6:28pm EST. She is 8lbs6oz, 21 inches long, and is just wonderful and the most beautiful girl in the whole world. Our labor was very long, and had some twists and turns to it, but we'll go in to that another day. For now, we are doing great and couldn't be happier.

Just one more thing to add...

Here we are - 3 days from the official due date. Everything is all ready to go- nursery (check), bags packed (check), dog sitter lined up (check)- now just one more thing...Oh yea, the baby needs to come!

Blake Farm & Orchard

We went to Blake's Farm & Orchard during the weekend- where you can pick your own apples and other assorted produce. Along side it is a fresh cider mill and restaurant. It was a beautiful fall day to be out in farm country.

This place was huge- rows and rows and rows of apples- and all sorts of types of apples that I haven't even heard of! By the time we leave Michigan, I plan on being a apple expert.

Yes- there was a tractor train.

There was no stopping the mass sampling of all the apples. So juicy and fresh-mmmm.

There were also tons of raspberries that were sooooo yummy. We couldn't stop tasting them.

And of course, some pumpkins! Gotta love the fall!