Monday Oct 2nd, 2017
I was scheduled to get an induction on Monday Oct 2nd at 39.5 weeks pregnant! We woke up that morning filled with anticipation and well wishing texts from family and friends. We had to be ready for the hospital to call us in at any time of day, but I was pretty sure it would be mid-morning. Since Mom was in town, we decided to distract ourselves by going to Half Moon Bay; we hit Poplar beach, Jersey Joe's cheesesteak sandwiches (amazing), even stopped at a pumpkin patch...still no call. We called the hospital periodically to get an update and they kept saying it was busy and to wait just a few more hours. By 10:30pm, they said we were pushed back to tomorrow morning.
 |
| Poplar Beach, Half Moon Bay - Not a bad way to spend the final hours of pregnancy (Or so we thought) |
 |
| This is the belly of a woman who needs the pregnancy to be over...like NOW |
Tuesday Oct 3rd
We couldn't sleep that night because of the nervous anticipation so we finally just got up at 4am. Since the hospital hadn't called yet we went to Happy Hollow Zoo, then cleaned the entire house and vacuumed the car (because my pregnancy brain couldn't handle the thought of bringing home the baby in a cluttered car). I get some serious nesting instincts when I'm pregnant! Everything has to be organized perfectly to limit the chaos that comes with having a baby. When I was pregnant with Owen and we moved, I had to arrange our moving boxes in order of size and brand.
 |
| This took me hours...totally worth it |
Finally, at 3pm we got the call! I gave Owen a snuggle goodbye and grabbed some pizza for the road. We checked in at 4pm, and went straight to my delivery room. It felt so weird and awesome to bypass the triage room since that was the hardest part of my last delivery. I was feeling really hopeful that it would just go smoothly and we'd have our baby boy by the end of the night. (HA!) I flipped on the TV and settled in for a quick, pleasant stay. In retrospect, I was probably being a little unrealistic. You can ask Tim - I tend to have a huge optimism bias; basically that means I always think things are going to turn out great even when there's contrary evidence (i.e. my last labor). It's people like me that are always late because when the GPS tells me 25 minutes, I always think "yeah, but I'll probably hit the lights just right and get there in 20!" It's a blessing and a curse, really...
 |
| Me thinking I'm gonna have a baby that night |
Well anyway, that optimism lasted all of 45 minutes before the nurse came in to place my IV. I have a pretty bad (and totally justifiable!) fear of needles. I wish I could go hide under a rock and never see a needle again, but with childbirth they're kind of unavoidable. It took multiple attempts and a couple different nurses to place the IV in my notoriously small veins and they kept poking all the way through and rupturing it. When they got one placed in my wrist it itched and stung but they couldn't adjust it for fear of losing the vein. I was 1.5 cm dilated and 30% effaced so they started me on a pill to ripen the cervix. It gave me contractions every couple minutes until 1am when the doctor decided to switch to cervadil, which had to be in for 12 hours. That was really disappointing because that meant we weren't having this baby tonight. I thought they were going to start me on pitocin right away, break my water and BOOM I'd have a baby. Waiting around wouldn't be so bad, except my wrist IV was bothering me so much I couldn't sleep so I was just anxious to get this whole thing over with and get the IV out.
 |
| I don't have any non-horrible pictures of my hospital stay, so I'll just use baby pics instead |
Wednesday Oct 4th
I spent the morning watching Star Wars and bouncing on the birthing ball through contractions. At 1pm the doctor took out the cervadil and informed me that I had no dilation change. That was pretty disappointing because I'd been having strong contractions for over 12 hours now- how could they not be doing anything? The doctor's next step was the foley balloon, so I had to get the epidural then too because inserting the foley balloon when you're only 1cm dilated is pretty rough. But after all that was over, it was nice to relax a little and finally catch a break from the contractions. After a few hours the balloon came out and I was dilated to 3cm so they started pitocin. By 6pm I was at 6cm and we started feeling excited!
 |
| Nobody wants to see a picture of me in an oxygen mask anyway |
Thursday Oct 5th
You know you're a parent when you've googled, "how long can the human body go without sleep?"
At 1am I was really frustrated that the epidural wasn't working and I had been at 10cm for an hour and yet we were on a holding pattern for some reason. I'm grateful for nurses doing their job and all, but sometimes I just don't understand their methods. By this point, the nurses that were on shift 2 days ago when I first got to the hospital were returning and were all like, "wow, you're still here?" At 2:20am we finally demanded that they let me start pushing! Last time, the doctor had to tell me when to push because I wasn't feeling the contractions. So, that was a new experience this time, feeling everything and knowing what to do. Just 25 minutes later, Roger Everett Perkins was born! He weighed 7lbs 15oz - a whole pound lighter than Owen. The doctor said Roger delivered face-up, so he was posterior just like Owen - she said that probably contributed to the long labor.
I kind of didn't expect the birth of the 2nd baby to be as exciting or memorable as the first, but the moment Roger was born was so special! Weirdly, he looked exactly how Tim and I had been picturing him all along. We both just felt really grateful that he got here healthy and without any major complications.
 |
| I mean, look at that face! :) |
 |
| First selfie with Daddy! |
 |
| 2 months |
 |
| 3 Months |
