She's here!

Emily Alice was born on Saturday morning at 10:25. She weighed 6 lbs 12 oz and is 19 3/4 inches long. We are so in love with her already!

She is asleep now so I just wanted to post a blog update. Sorry, this is going to be long. I was not feeling too great on Thanksgiving, still having tons of back pain. We went to my aunts house for our annual Turkey Day celebration and after eating I was so exhausted that I just layed on my Aunt's couch and am a little sad I didn't get to socialize with my cousins who were in from out of town. I was just exhausted. Anyway, after that we went to Mom and Roberts and again, all I really was up for was laying of the couch, but I did get to have a nice visit with Zig's sister and our cousin Alice. Later that night we went to bed. My back pain was starting to get worse as the night went on. I woke up several times, trying to adjust and get comfortable, to no avail. I finally woke up Zig around 7 friday morning (Due date day!) and we started to time them because at that point they were moving into my lower abdomen. They weren't really timeable, so we decided to go to breakfast with my Family. Little did I know, that would be my last meal pregnant. I am so glad I ordered the pancakes. ;) I was still in a lot of pain all through breakfast and afterwards we went to my moms to just relax and watch movies. Throughout the movies, my contractions started to get closer together, coming ever 5-6 minutes and lasting over a minute. They did hurt really bad and several times made me cry, but looking back, they weren't as bad as I had always thought they would be. Fast forward a few hours and I was in pain and just not feeling myself. We left my moms around 4 and went straight to the hospital. I had been putting it off because I didn't want to be sent home. We got there and they checked us into triage. I was 4 cm and 80% effaced. My contractions were now consistently 5 mins apart and lasting a minute. They admitted us and around 7:30 I got my epidural. HEAVEN. Seriously. I had no pain from that point on until delivery. Our families are such troopers...Everyone waited around for several hours and our parents even spent the night in the waiting room. At one point we had 12 people in the waiting room. Thinking about it now makes me so emotional. I love that they were all there and that everyone was so excited even though it would be SEVERAL hours before Emily actually came. Everyone thought for sure that she would be there before midnight..my due date and grandmothers birthday. Around 11:00 the doctor came in and checked my dilation again and I had only progressed to 5 cm so she broke my water. I was so glad for the epi, because it allowed both Zig and I to get some sleep. Fast forward to 6:30am on Saturday and I was ready to push. At one pint during the night my oxygen levels had dropped and I had to get oxygen, which totally dried out my throat. Since I have asthma, they ordered me an inhaler, which took almost 2 hours to come. I was really excited though because my doctor started her shift at 7, which meant she was going to deliver me. I started pushing around 9:00 and little Emily was here at 10:25. During that time, I wasn't able to feel my contractions because of the epi, which made pushing difficult, so they decided to give me pitocin and turn of the epi for a short time. That short time made a ton of difference (even though it was only 5 mins or so) because I was in some pretty bad pain towards the end of the pushing. I was super emotional and honestly I don't handle pain well. Zig is such a trooper. He was so encouraging and supportive. I feel bad because I know there were a couple of times I told him to stop touching me. When I am in pain, I just want to be left alone, but he still stood there and took my crap and I love him so so much for all he had done over the last few days. Again, I am so lucky. Some time during the night I also started to run a low grade fever. They gave me some tylenol to try and bring it down before delivery, but it was still there when Emily was born. Here is where it got crazy. Since I had a fever they were worried that I had an infection and that I passed it to Emily. This required her to be taken to the NICU for a mandatory 48 hour stay. I was so crushed. I was still in a lot of pain and I had a 2nd degree tear. After Emily came, they immediately put her on my chest and I held her and Zig and I both cried. It was really amazing, but then we found out that they were going to take her, about my possible infection, I wasn't clotting so I required a huge shot in my thigh and all the while there were nurses everywhere trying to tell me what was going to happen next. It was too much. I felt like I couldn't really enjoy the moment and I was super emotional. Everything is better now. We both were put on antibiotics and Emily was monitored 1 floor down from where we were. This made feeding very challenging. We were called every couple of hours to go downstairs to feed her (which was and is a huge challenge all in itself). I am a little sad it turned out to be that way, but I am so so glad that Emily was being closly monitored and didn't show any signs of infection. I have to say, I am very very happy with Pres. All our nurses were AMAZING. The NICU people are the most incredible people I have ever met. That made the very difficult experience so much better.

Anyway, we are all home now. We were discharged Monday afternoon and are enjoying our time as a new family.

So how do I feel? Like I got hit by a truck. I am still in a ton of pain, and was told I may not feel "normal" for several months because of the tear. I take each day at a time. I am super emotional too, but I am sure it has something to do with the change in hormones and the fact that I feel like I have NO clue of what I am doing and just praying I am doing the right thing. I told myself during the pregnancy that I wsn't going to read a book because what works fro one person, may not work for everyone and I didn't want to get too caught up in one person's opinion and that I wouldn't get too worked up if things didn't go as planned. I kind of regret that now, but am lucky because I have lots of people I can turn to with questions. I feel SO paranoid all the time though. I worry that I am not feeding her enough and that something that I am doing could hurt her. My milk came in on Monday, but we are still having some latch issues. The pediatrician told us to look for 4-6 very wet diapers a day and 1-2 poopie ones. It seems like she is only having the poopie ones, which sends me into panic mode since it is not the norm. I think I am driving Zig crazy, but I can't help it. As we all know from this whole pregnancy, I am a huge worrier. I am amazed at how well my body has tried to bounce back. With in the first 2 days my uterus had almost completly retracted down and my tummy, while very jiggly is started to really go back to the way it was. It may never be exactly the same, but I was worried I would have giant gut that would just hang there. It is amazing what a women's body can go through and its ability to recover. I am just taking each day at a time.

Anyway, I know this is super long. I wanted to write it all out more so that I would be able to remember it all, but to share my experience with all of you. I love my daughter so so much. Just thinking about her brings tears to my eyes. She is absolutely perfect! Keep checking back for update. I know I never really posted my 39-40 week update. Maybe if I feel brave, I will post those pictures, plus my 1 week post partum ones. People always seem interested in that. I know I was when I was pregnant. And you can expect tons and tons of pictures of our little bit. Here is one for now. She is only 2 days old here. Many many more to come and we now embark on being parents. Tomorrow I will try and post on how things have been going since we have been home.