Amelia's Birth Story

April 27th, 2012  Friday

On Thursday night we dropped off the dogs at Gran-gran's house and then we dropped off Evan at Nana's house. Evan was so excited to have a sleepover! Then Dan and I went to Walmart to pick up sodas for after the surgery and grab a movie to watch the night (The Sitter-funny...) it was pretty surreal. My last pregnant night of sleeping with a huge belly. Or not sleeping, I think maybe I got two hours of sleep total, it was really hard to fall alseep, I kept thinking of baby names and things I needed to do in the morning.

In the morning on Friday we woke up at 3:45am and I took a shower and blow dried my hair. Then Dan looked at the clock and said we only had five minutes left! We left the house at 5am, the car ride was long and strange, driving with no one else on the road in the dark, going to the hospital to have our baby girl. Thru the whole pregnancy I never thought I would make it to this planned surgery day, I was convinced that contractions or water breaking would happen before the 27th and I would get a more "unexpected" experience. I promised everyone I would be in shock if I made it to the day and I think I was really in a state of shock that whole car ride. We arrived at the hospital by 5:30am, Dan dropped me off with the luggage and parked the car, then we went up to the 3rd floor.

They got me checked into a room LR10 and I got my IV started first thing to get pumped full of liquids. My mom and dad came around 7am. There were a lot of nurses in and out, but by 7:30am they wheeled me off to the operating room. I got my spinal, which Dan watched the anesthesiologist perform it (ick!). The worst moment was sitting there on the table waiting for the spinal. The doctor asked me what I was thinking, and I said I did not want to be here doing this! It was awful, the good thing was I felt less pressure/pain this time around then the first time. They had a hard time opening the incision, it felt like forever, they joked that I must be working out, I said, ya lifting up a two year old all day. Finally I heard my baby crying, she was born at 8am exactly! I teared up when I heard her cry! They took her for cleaning, then I got to see Dan holding her. We got a few photos and I got to see her precious face. We thought maybe she had red hair and I teased Dan about calling her Ruby, which was a name he hated throughout the name discussions. After the surgery ( I could hear them doing the staples--gross!) they wheeled me back to my room and I had to wait 3 hours. They told us our baby girl had to stay for observation in the nursery for 3 hours since she was a c-section baby. I was mad about this because Evan did not have to do that and I wanted to be able to nurse her as soon as possible, so it was a long wait.

I finally got to hold and nurse my baby girl. And after a short while everyone came to see her and hold her. Evan got to visit us around noon on Friday. He kept saying "baby came out", he was so happy and excited to meet his new baby sister. We have very precious videos of those first moments. And I am so glad because it is a little hard for me to remember details, I think because of the pain meds and the numbing meds wearing off, I have hazy general memories from the experience. I was telling Dan that I don't really remember much that happened in LR10. I do know that I had a horrible nose itching side effect from the drugs and about rubbed my nose raw!

We had to send the birth certificate lady away on Friday because it took us until Saturday morning to decide to name her Amelia Claire. Auntie Tara was holding her on Friday and said she thought she looked like an Amelia and it stuck. Dan and I love her name so much.

On Saturday night at around 9pm they had us move over to the other side to the recovery rooms, I got to take a shower, and even though the room was much smaller, it seemed cozier, and I remember better what happened on Sunday and Monday. Sunday we had baby Amelia's photos done by the hospital photographer. They came out adorable! Auntie Tara was there too. Sunday was my favorite day because everyone came to visit me separately and I was actually able to focus. Saturday everyone had visited me at the same time and I was very overwhelmed. Sunday Evan was very whiny when he visited, he really wanted to know when we could all go home together and things could back to normal. I think he was having a blast at nana and pa's house but was ready to get his mommy and daddy back.

my last pregnant photo, here I am right after putting on my hospital gown

 dr.harris delivering our bay girl