Our little buddy

Our little buddy, Hank, finally arrived just over 3 weeks ago, on September 15th at 8:10pm.  I was a week overdue and was induced, something I dreaded, for good reason - it sucked!  I don't know how much easier natural labor would have been, and I guess I'll never know, but I'd heard being induced was more intense and I can only imagine it was. 

I went to the hospital at 7am that day to get the party started.  The rest of the day seemed like if things could go wrong they were going to.  Within an hour or so I was supposedly on the Pitocin drip, but Julian noticed the IV lying on the side of the bed, dripping onto the floor.  Thank goodness he noticed that - I'd been sitting there for almost an hour thinking the drip had started and it wasn't hooked up right!  Next my doctor had difficulty breaking the water and had to try probably 4 times before it broke (and we later saw lots of scratch marks on Hank's head from the attempts).  The next many hours sucked - it turns out I had what's called "back labor", where the baby is turned the wrong way, with his head facing out instead of towards you, which causes the back of his head to hit your spinal column and all the nerves around there.  What fun!  So I labored until about 2 or 3pm with just some type of narcotic and realized that was not going to be nearly enough.  The pain in my lower back also shot through my upper legs - it was excrutiating.  Plus I had the normal (but more intense due to the Pitocin) contractions.  So labor plus horrible back and leg pain.  I couldn't walk around any more and couldn't even move or speak (beyond crying and tearing my hair out) and begged for an epidural.  The epidural helped a ton, but didn't fully work and I could still feel the pain in my back and left leg.  My right leg was so dead I couldn't even move it.  The anesthesiologist said that was very uncommon, and apologized, but it was still a big improvement.  Several hours later my doctor had them turn the epidural down by a 1/3 so I could feel more of the contractions and hopefully the urge to push (which never happened).  By then Hank was experiencing distress due to the contractions being so close together.  He wasn't able to recover and his heart rate kept dropping.  That's when things got scary.  My doctor wanted to do an emergency c-section because she was worried about him, and that scared me to death.  They put me on oxygen to help him, and at one point I said that I thought the tube had come undone, but they said no, everything was fine.  Julian noticed many minutes later that it had been undone, I was just breathing into a plastic mask with no air.  I knew it!

I was finally able to get him down far enough that she then began to say she wanted to take me to the operating room to get him out with foreceps - another horrible option - but I said do whatever if it means Hank being ok.  Luckily I got him out all on my own, with the help of Julian, my doctor and probably 4 nurses.  Phew! 

Once he was out he was kind of blue and barely moving.  They resuscitated him and within a few minutes he was doing great.  It was pretty scary to not hear him cry for so long. 

In the end, everything worked out and we have a healthy, although seemingly colicky, baby.  Here are some pics:

Me with Hank, after he was doing better

My brother, Christian, the night Hank was born

My sister, Anne, the day after Hank was born (still in hospital)

My sister, Emily, and brother, Max, a few days later

Fast asleep in one of his cute poses

Asleep with daddy

Looking cute, just a few days old

With his new friend, Amanda

Mommy and Hank just yesterday