For Our Dinner Tonight

Disney Princesses.

Courtesy of T.

I did not stage this.

Birth Story

It took me a while to calm down enough and get everything ready to go, so we didn't make it to the hospital until around 9 that night.
They started me on pitocin around 10:30. Contractions started up a few hours later and they intensified quickly. The night nurse came in just before her shift ended at 7am to check on me and told me I was still only around a 3.5 - what I was when I came in the night before.

I wanted to rip my IV out and go home, but instead I asked for an epidural because I knew I couldn't handle these kinds of contractions for the next 20 hours. I assumed I'd be laboring all day based on my previous experience with T and the fact that the pitocin was obviously doing nothing for me.

It was at this point that I was informed that because I wasn't at a 4 I was not yet in "active labor" and couldn't get an epidural until I was.
I didn't like this nurse. She was kind of rude and it took her 4 or 5 painful tries before she got my IV in, and now she was telling me I couldn't have drugs when I wanted them.
I decided I really didn't like her when my doctor came in 10 minutes later to check me herself and tell me that no, I actually was at a 4. So there, dumb nurse. Get me my epidural! My doctor also broke my water and said she bet she would see me before noon to deliver my baby. I internally rolled my eyes. I thought I would be lucky to have her by that day.

I sat through a very long hour of increasingly intensifying contractions before the anesthesiologist arrived. I remember thinking these contractions felt the same way as the ones I had with T right before I had to push. They were bad.
Seth, sadly, had to leave the room while they put the epidural in. In case you don't know, having to sit perfectly still while you are having painful contractions and they are shoving a huge needle into your back is probably the hardest thing to do ever. When they were done the nurse had me lay on my side.

And then instead of sweet relief, I was hit with the most painful contraction ever. I was screaming. I think I was actually behaving like those ladies do in the movies. I remember thinking "I think I need to push. That can't be right. It's only been an hour and a half since my doctor checked me and I was only a 4 then."
The nurse was smarter than me (a new nurse that I liked) and immediately realized something was wrong with my reaction. She checked - I was at a 10.
And all that dumb epidural had time to do was numb up my legs, which only made delivery infinitely harder.

She had me call Seth to tell him to come back to the room. He picked up and I said "Get back here. I am about to have this baby." Maybe a little dramatic, but I was in a panic (and a lot of pain) at the time. Probably one of the craziest phone calls he's gotten, since when he left 15 minutes earlier he assumed I was still hours away from delivering.
Anyway, Seth came running, my doctor came running, I pushed for about 15 minutes, and we had Hailey at 8:53 am!

So with T I had a 30 hour labor (although how much of that was "active labor" now I don't know), with H it dropped to 2 hours. I am a little afraid that the next baby I have will also want to significantly decrease labor time and I will be having it on the kitchen floor.
Hmm. But - loved having such a short labor.

And I love this girl.

You

T thinks her name is "you."
And it's my fault.

I didn't realize it was not a good idea to always say "Look! It's you!" when we looked in the mirror or at pictures of her.
And now when I ask her what her name is, her response is "you" and all I hear all day is T chanting "you, you, you, you" because she wants to look at photos of herself.

So mothers of young children, learn from my mistake or you will be spending weeks and weeks undoing the damage like I currently am.

A visit

Granddad came for a visit.

And the two of them found they had a lot in common.

Sibling Rivalry

All throughout my pregnancy people kept asking me how T was going to deal with the new baby.
That's because most people that know T know that while she enjoys playing with other little children, she enjoys going home alone with her parents a little more. She'd be quite all right as an only child.
So you can imagine I was worried.

It kind of went like this:
1st day: LOVED her.

She was doing this nervous/excited laugh all day.
2nd day: Confused by why she wasn't leaving with the other family visitors
3rd day: Very clingy towards Seth and I/mean to H
1 week: Nice to H/only sometimes mean (aka normal sibling relationship)

She gives her kisses, rubs her head, offers her food and drink and toys, and gets excited when H wiggles and opens her eyes.

(That would be 1 half-eaten graham cracker, a few Connect-4 pieces, Uno, and Bohnanza. Right after I took this she also lovingly placed a book and the camera in her lap.)
However she also seems to want to sit in my lap only when I am holding H and she has smacked her on the head/pinched her face/poked her in the eye more than a few times.

I think it's the start of a beautiful relationship.

Life with Two

I'm pretty sure everyone who reads this blog is also my facebook friend but just in case:

This little girl was born 2 weeks ago on January 25th.

My mom has been here helping me for the past 2 weeks so I have been trying to take advantage of her presence by sleeping as much as possible.

T has been trying to take advantage of her ipad by demanding to play with it as much as possible. 

H has been taking advantage of the fact that there's a third adult around to hold her.

My mom leaves tomorrow and we will all be sad to see her go.