A lot to cover...

I can't believe it's been a week already! So much has happened in the last week, I don't even know where to begin. Let's see, I guess the birth story would be a good place...

We went in to the hospital Wednesday evening at 7:30 to be induced. I received my first dose of the medicine to start contractions at about 8:45, and it started working pretty quickly. The contractions weren't bad at that point, just kind of uncomfortable. As the night wore on, they became more intense and I asked for something to help me sleep so they brought me some Ambien. Well, that didn't really work. At some point I asked for something for the pain and they brough me some Stadol. Now that's powerful stuff! I was in a completely different world after that. They checked me sometime later and I had only dilated to 1 1/2 centimeters, I still had a LONG way to go. I don't remember what time they gave me the Pitocin to make the contractions stronger, but it worked by golly. Sometime in the afternoon they checked me again and I had progressed to 4 centimeters. I could have an epidural now! Unfortunately, the epidural only worked for about 2 hours. The doctors were saying that something was wrong with the pump, and I should still be getting the medicine, but I obviously wasn't. I have never felt pain like that in my life. Thank God for Chris. I never would have made it through without him. He was definitely my rock throughout the entire ordeal. At about 8 o'clock the nurse checked me again & said I was at about 5-6. They were going to up the Pitocin, and if I didn't make any progress by 9:00 they would start talking about a c-section. I was so glad to hear those words at that point. I had been laboring for nearly 24 hours, most of those without any pain medication, and I was completely worn out. At 9:00 she checked again and I had progressed to about a 7. The doctor said he wanted to wait another hour and I lost it. The only word I can think of to describe how I was feeling is desperation. I was in so much pain, and was so tired. Then it hit me that I was going to have to push out a nearly 9 pound baby with no pain help. I was so scared. I asked her to check me again at around 9:30, and she thought I'd progressed a little, but she called Dr. Doris in to check on me. He thought I had made a little progress too, but also said that I had been progressing very slowly. He said we could really go either way, keep trying the way we were or move on to a c-section and he left it up to me. I immediately said "C-section". It's amazing how quickly things happened after that. The anesthesiologist was in trying to get the epidural to work, because if they didn't, they'd have to put me to sleep & Chris wouldn't be able to be in there with me. Unfortunately, that's the way it worked out. They pumped me with so much medication, but I could still feel it when they'd pinch my right side. Obviously they weren't going to cut me open when I could feel it. So, off to sleep I went. And when I woke up, I had a son! It's kind of sad, because I don't really remember seeing Jonathan the first time because I was so drugged up, and I can't get those moments back. But I know that we did what we had to do. It turns out that he probably wouldn't have come out the "conventional" way after all, he was face up & trying to come out with his head cocked to one side. We made the right decision, and I'm happy about that.

Wow. That was a long story! I was going to post some more, but I think I'll just put a few pictures up & come back later for more. Here's my little man.

Have you ever seen such an adorable face?