may 11, 2009.

sorry it's taken so long to post about serena's birthday! it's been a bit of a rough recovery and a huge adjustment with her home, so i've had little time to blog. here's how the day went:

my doctor induced me a week early, and boy are we glad he did, considering how big she already was. we checked into the hospital at 8am, got changed into my lovely hospital gown, got our name tags on, and got hooked up to an iv. i could write a whole post about what a nightmare my ivs were, but let's just say it was painful, i got poked a lot in several places, my left arm became hugely swollen at one point, and i now have some REALLY nasty bruises. anyway, they got me started on the pitocin around 9am and the waiting began.

when they first checked me, i was dilated to a 2 and 80% effaced. not much changed until around noon when my doctor came in and broke my water. he told me at that point that we were looking at an 8 or 9pm delivery... which was slightly discouraging to hear. after that, the contractions started actually hurting. by 1pm, i started feeling them in my back a lot, so i got the epidural. i wish i had waited just a little longer. only because i still labored for 7 more hours and i felt completely useless. i didn't love that sean & the nurses had to help me move positions, fix my socks, reach everything for me, etc, etc, etc. but i'm super glad i wasn't feeling any of those contractions we kept seeing on the monitor! the only discomfort aside from being useless, was the nausea. i felt pretty sick every time i moved, so i stayed in one position {on my left side} pretty much the last 7 hours. i fell asleep a few times, and sean and i watched a bunch of episodes of gilmore girls :)

it took me until about 5pm to get dilated to a 6. the nurse had told us before that moving positions can help speed up the labor, so sean and i started to maneuver me to my right side. suddenly the nurses all came rushing into our room and told us we needed to move me back immediately. apparently serena's heartrate dropped significantly and she did NOT like me being on my right side! it kind of scared the heck out of both of us. but it did indeed speed up the labor! by about 7pm i was dilated to an 8. the nurse said she would let my doctor know and that baby would be coming soon! shortly after that i started feeling the pressure and knew that it was time to push. they checked me and i had gone from an 8 to a 10 in about 15 minutes. by the time my doctor showed up, he said "well, you're ready to go!". and it all went soooo quickly after that!

in about 5 minutes, they had all the equipment in the room. they kept saying how huge her head was, which was scary to hear! but i pushed through about 5 or 6 contractions and she was here. i can't describe how amazing it was to see her for the first time. they laid her on my belly and i was just overwhelmed and speechless. i just stared in awe as they took her over to the lamp and cleaned her up. the nurses had to remind sean to get out the camera. he was as overwhelmed as i was! they were all amazed how what a big baby she was. we had hoped for a chunky baby, but i wish her head hadn't been quite so big for my sake :)

she is so perfect and i have to say, she is the cutest baby i've ever seen. i know i'm biased, but seriously, she's adorable! it has been crazy to have her home. i am so exhausted, but it couldn't be for a better cause. we just love her and stare at her all day. hopefully we get used to this whole no sleep business soon.

{pictures later. i need a nap now.}