Aleah's birth story

Aleah's Birth story

Born: Feb 2, 2012 at 10:05 weighing 6 lbs 14 oz

We went to bed the night of Feb 1 at around 10:00. At this point I was used to not getting much sleep but this night I could not find a comfortable position what so ever, so I went out in the front room and turned on the t.v. Around midnight the contractions began. They were pretty regular but not too strong.

At 2am I decided I better start timing them. They were every 5 minutes or so at this point. At 4am I got on the internet to check my email and that's when my water broke. I had not woke Jay up to tell him anything was going on. He had no idea I had been up all night contracting but I figured it would be better for him to get some sleep. Also I had two "false labors" within the week so I wanted to make sure it was the real thing. So I went in our room and calmly said, "Love, my water broke." You would have thought I told him there was a fire in the house. He shot out of bed, I think he was still half asleep and started running around trying to figure out what to grab. Of course I had everything packed and ready so I am not sure what he was doing but I just sat back and watched. It felt like in the movies when the husband forgets to take his wife as he is driving off to the hospital. We finally got our things in the car and Jay grabbed Brylee out of bed and we were off to Shae's to drop her off. Jay was still kind of in panic mode and in the parking lot of the hospital I had to stop and say, "I need you to calm down for me." You would think he was the one in labor. From that point on he was very calm and reassuring throughout the whole process.

I had an induction scheduled for the day before, but I had cancelled it because I really wanted her to come on her own. So when I showed up at the hospital the nurse told me that all the nurses were betting that I would come in that night since I had cancelled the induction. And they were right. And I was happy that I was able to come in on my own.

We got all checked in and my contractions were every 2-3 minutes and I was dilated to a 6. I was practicing my hypnobirthing which was working great, I had no pain and thing were going good. I wanted to walk around but the doctor advised me not to walk since my water broke he was worried about something, I cant remember exactly what. So all I could do was lay there. The doctor came in and checked me around 7am and I was now dilated to a 7. Another hour or so goes by and he comes in again. I am staying the same now and he offers to start me on Pitocin. He said, "Well we could go on like this for another 7 or 8 hours or we could give you the pitocin and your baby will be here in a half hour." Hmmm a half hour sure sounded great to me about then. I was still not in pain but it definitely isn't the most comfortable thing in the world to be laboring for that long. So I told him that we could start the pitocin but first I wanted to get my epidural. He said,"Of course, lets get started!"

I got the epidural at 9am. I was so numb it was the weirdest feeling ever. I didn't like it, and asked the nurse if she could turn it down. She said it would get better and it actually did get better after a little bit. When I had my epidural with Brylee I was able to feel my legs so this was just very different. I was checked again around 9:45. Dr looked at us and said "Lets have a baby!" I was like, Huh, that's it? So they got all set up and he said, "okay here comes a contraction go ahead and push." There was her head. Push again, head out. Push again, shes here! She came in one contraction! The cord was wrapped around her neck twice, but it didn't seem to cause her any distress during the labor so that was good. It was the easiest pain free labor I could have asked for. Aleah was here and more perfect than ever. She cried right away and I was able to hold and nurse her almost right away.

I was totally expecting a big baby because Brylee was 8 lbs 13 oz. But she was just a itty bitty 6lbs 14 oz. She was born at 10:05. There were a lot of similarities between my girls births, like I went into labor on the night of their due dates with both, both times started timing contractions at 2am, both girls water broke at 4am(but Brylee was 24 hours later than Aleah), Bry was born at 11 Aleah at 10. One big difference though was that Bry's labor was 33 hours and Aleah was only 10. I'm not sure how they decide how long labor is but from when the regular contractions start is what I am going off of. I will take the 10 hours in a second over my first experience!

It is so lovely to have her here with us, she is a little sweetheart. Very calm and she has slept all night since day one(I wake her to eat and diaper change of course) She is now 2 weeks old today and we are so in love with her. Even Brylee seems to be adjusting to her, she is very gentle with her and is my happy helper as much as she can be. I feel very blessed to be my girls mom and couldn't be any happier at the moment.

We did our newborn picture session with her and I only have a small preview from it, so more to come :)