You've been keeping us pretty busy - so busy, in fact, that I haven't had the chance to document anything about your birth, which happened on April 27th. Yep - that's right! Those were real contractions your mom was having in the shower.
We have a video of us driving to the hospital at around 2:45 in the morning (I took out the part that shows your mom going through one of the contractions):
When we got there, they almost weren't going to admit us. Your mom wasn't dilated at all, but was 80% effaced (meaning the wall was thinning, but the door wasn't open). Normally, the hospital won't admit you until you're 4 or 5 centimeters dilated.
Then the contractions started getting even more painful, and your mom and I didn't know what we were going to do if they told us to go home and labor some more on our own before coming back. The nurse told us to walk around for an hour, and then she would check your mom again before calling the doctor. Otherwise, if she called him right then, she thought he would most likely tell us to go home.
But before we could leave the room, another woman was wheeled into maternity outside our room. She was in a lot of pain, and too far along the process to get an epidural. It sounded like she was being murdered, and your mom and I were terrified. Is this what it was going to be like? Was she about to experience that much terrible pain?
At around 4:45 AM, the nurse came back in and checked your mom. She was 100% effaced and 1 cm dilated. She said she thought that was a good change, and went off to call the doctor. By 5:00 AM, the call came back and we were admitted to the hospital. We were elated that we weren't going to have to go home and then come back!
It would still be a while before they could give your mom the epidural, and she was really not having a good time, so they gave her a little bit of pain medication to "take the edge off". It helped for maybe twenty minutes, but then she was back to feeling it full force.
At around 6:20 AM, Dr. Carney came in to give your mom the epidural. Here's where things started to go wrong. He poked your mom seven times before he was successful at getting the epidural started, and warned us that your mom could develop a spinal headache if he had punctured the "dura" - the part of your mom's back that he wasn't supposed to puncture. He looked like he thought he had punctured it, so he gave your mom a very low dose of the epidural - 4 cc's, where the normal amount for someone as tall as your mom is 10 - 15 cc's. We wouldn't find out till later just how significant this problem was. Your mom had back surgery last year, and her discs are pretty thin, making the epidural trickier on her than some other poeple because the space is so small. However, the fact that it was successful was enough to celebrate for the moment. For a while there, I was worried they were going to tell us that she wouldn't be able to get one.
By 7:00 AM, the epidural was complete, but your mom was still only 1 cm dilated. At 8:15 AM, another check revealed that she was 4cm dilated. We were on track, and your mom's pain was lessened for the moment. In fact, she couldn't feel her legs!
Dr. Du, the doctor who would deliver you, then broke your mom's water bag at 8:45 AM, to keep things moving along.
At 9:00 AM, members of the family started to show up. Your Grandma Kate and Uncle Josh were there, with your cousins Alex and Casey. Your Uncle Mike came later, and then your Grandpa came with his video camera! (He made a great 3-minute video of your delivery that I'm sure you've now seen many times!)
At 11:00 AM, your mom was 6 cm dilated, and at 1:00 PM she was 8 cm. Another aneasthesiologist had come in and pumped up your mom's epidural to 10 cc's because she was really feeling the contractions. Then things started to accelerate, and by 1:45 PM, your mom was already 9.5 cm dilated, and they decided to wheel us into a different room at 2:30 PM. (Luckily, a larger one!)
By 2:55, the nurse said your mom was 10 cm dilated and ready to push. Your Grandma Kate video-taped you coming into the world at 3:48 PM! I cut the cord, and you were wisked over to the table to be examined and cleaned up. You were 19.5 inches long and weighed 7 pounds 8 ounces, and were the most beautiful baby any of us had ever seen! And so pink!
Right after, when Dr. Du tried to deliver your mom's placenta, your mom's uterus inverted - meaning, the placenta was still hanging on for dear life, and when the doctor tried to pull it out, the back part of the uterus started to come with it. Well, that can be a pretty serious problem, and your mom would have had to go immediately to the operating room if Dr. Du hadn't been able to punch her uterus back in place. I remember standing there, my attention torn between you, who seemed to have some fluid in your lungs, and your mom, who was being subjected to some pretty violent maneuvers by the doctor. In the end, Dr. Du was successful, and you were healthy, so things seemed to be going well. But we weren't out of the woods yet.
The next day, Thursday, I attended your little "manhood surgery" and in the afternoon, your mom's spinal headache caught up with her. One of the specialists helping out with the fine art of breast-feeding, alerted the doctors that that pain your mom was having in her neck was not normal. Another anaesthesiologist came in, and in a couple of hours, your mom was having a "blood patch" performed. The idea is to plug the leaking spinal column with her own blood, sealing off the leak until the body can heal itself. Your mom was so happy you were healthy and that the delivery had gone so well, but she was just plain miserable.
Well, the "blood patch" procedure worked, but only for a couple of days. You came home on Friday, April 29th, and by Sunday, your mom was back in the hospital. Grandma Kate was taking care of you Sunday night when we left for the emergency room. We got there at around 11:00 PM, and your mom was just in misery. We cursed the name of Dr. Carney, and hoped that an emergency room doctor could help.
We stayed up at your Grandma Kate's for a couple of days, just so your mom could have some extra help and lie down as much as possible. Then, we brought you home again, and that's where we saw you laugh today. Here, with us, at your home.
So that's pretty much the story of how you came into the world! It wasn't without effort, but it was worth every bit of it!
We love you so much, and are so glad you're healthy! We'll do everything we can to make sure you have a happy childhood. Welcome to the planet, buddy!
Dad
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