Eli! {and The Birth Story}

Let's start with some vital stats:
Eli Paul Harris (yes, we finally chose a name)
Oct. 16th, 2010 11:42 pm
8 lbs 9 oz 20 in long
Verdict: practically perfect in every way

We are all doing really well; we're not yet dying from lack of sleep, Jack is adjusting (thanks to much, much help from Grandma), and Eli is a sweetheart. Here are a lot of pictures (some of Jack too) and then the birth story (which you can feel free to skip . .)



So, here's how it all went down . . .

I'd been having tons of Braxton Hicks for about a week, and at my 39 week appointment on Wednesday, I was dilated to a two. This was pretty darn exciting for me, since with Jack I was dilated only to a "fingertip" when they induced me a week after his due date. Still, I doubted this kid would be coming any time soon. My mom drove into town on Friday night (from Montana), and we all commenced the waiting game. When Jack was born, she ended up having to hang out with a very pregnant me for two weeks before he was born; sorry Mom! Anyway, on Saturday evening we decided to drive up to the mall in Carlsbad to look for some more work clothes for Mike. As we were waiting in line at JCPenney to buy him a pair of pants, I realized that either my bladder was way fuller than I had anticipated or that some of my water was leaking. When I had Jack, they had to break my water, and it was this massive gushing torrent, so I wasn't sure that what was happening was my water breaking since this was no puddle-maker, but after a pitstop in the bathroom I realized that, uh, that pretty much had to be it. We decided to forgo poking into Macy's and headed straight home. At this point I'm still thinking "Ahh, my labor probably won't start on it's own anyway, and tomorrow morning I'll head into the hospital to get on the pitocin drip." Well, my water broke right at 7:00, and by 8:00 I'd had about half a dozen mild little contractions, which still didn't convince me of anything (I'm a hard sell). But around 8:45 they started coming about 3 minutes apart and got significantly more painful. So what do we do? Mike reminds me that I recently downloaded a Contraction Counter app onto my phone and suggests I rev it up and start keeping track. Good idea babe -- glad you were thinking more about it than I was! So we started keeping track, and after about a half hour I googled when I should call the doctor. Holy crap, we're almost there. Everything says 'when your contractions are 3-5 minutes apart, lasting 45-60 seconds each, for an hour.' Needless to say, that at 9:45 that was exactly what we'd had going on for the last hour. Through all of this I'd been trying to put together the finishing touches on our hospital bag (I of course had a list, you know), and Mike was feverishly trying to finish up some work stuff. If you know us well, you know that we're generally very organized and prepared, so I hope you're getting a sense for how caught off guard we were by all of this. Anyway, it probably was pretty funny to watch because there we were, Mike working and me trying to calmly put things together and eat (with Jack I was in labor for 25 hours and not allowed to eat the whole time, so I was trying to prepare myself), all the while breaking every two minutes for me to lean over the counter and breath through contractions while Mike let me squeeze his hand off. Bless my mom for remaining calm too! Ok, so we decided to call the doctor's office answering service to see what we should do; the answer we got was a resounding "bring her in now!" Oops. Thinking more about not wanting to have to extract Jack's carseat from the van so my Mom could have it while we were at the hospital, we hop in our little Sentra for the 20 minute ride to the hospital. Next time we're taking the car with the better shocks. Oh. My. Gosh. Contractions are bad; they're worse if you're sitting in a car; they're much worse if that car is older and you feel every single bump in the road and some more that you swear cropped up just to cause you misery. Well, when we made it up to the labor/delivery area of the hospital, they were ready and waiting for us and wasted no time in getting me gowned-up and revving up the room. Being the pansy that I am, I immediately asked how quickly they could get the epidural in me. I don't think I've ever signed a consent form that quickly! Anyway, we got to the hospital right around 10:40, and it probably took about half an hour or so to get everything going and for the anesthesiologist to get prepped. Once the epidural was in, we had about 10 more minutes of contractions and then maybe 20 of pushing before this little guy popped out.

There are three things about this experience that stand out:
1) It all went so quickly that I was shocked to death when Eli actually came out. I had no idea that I had dilated as quickly as I had, so when they said it was time to push I was very surprised. Then, I had no idea that the pushing had progressed so far so quickly so when he came out, I was like "Uh, excuse me?" I think that having had such a long labor with Jack I had more time to consider what the end result was going to be :).
2) The repercussions of my labor and delivery with Jack were really, really bad -- much worse than I'd remembered. I only have realized this because of how seemingly easy my recovery has been this time. Now, I'm sure that in a few weeks when my help is gone and the narcotics have run out, I'll be singing a different tune, but as for now, I'm about 500% better than I ever was right after Jack's birth.
3) I have never been in so much pain and hope to never experience it again. I can only think to describe it as harrowing. I truly didn't know how I was going to continue, and I'm actually kind of surprised that I made it through as much contracting as I did. It felt like my body was being pulled in so many directions, and I could hardly breath, and I sank into this delirium of pain where I felt that I was present but in some smaller place far away, trying to escape the pain. I don't think that all of the practiced breathing in the world could have prepared me for it. I think the only thing that kept me from actually passing out was the knowledge that the epidural was very very close to being put in and that Mike was right next to me and would do absolutely anything to keep me going. I know I squeezed him really hard, and I know I was doing some crazy shaking/convulsing, but he just stayed calm and did whatever I needed him to do. I don't know what people do who don't have such a loving man to be their everything in a time like that.

Well, there it is folks. Again, we were still a bit surprised at Eli's timely and speedy arrival. Perhaps it was the Relief Society Super Saturday craft morning that made him want to come check out the necklaces I made, or maybe it's his inborn desire to shop that made JCPenney the trigger . . . Whatever it was, I'm glad he's here, now that I'm used to the idea :).

Welcome Eli Paul!