Garrett's Birth Story

Waiting, waiting, waiting.

I should have known that if I had to wait 12 days to be induced, 

little Garrett would make me wait 18 long hours more.

I started pitocin at 8:30am on Tuesday, September 6th. 

I must say, that morning was pretty boring as we waited for something, anything, to happen.

My water broke on its own at 11:30am!

Finally! My body did something on its own! 

I was beyond excited not to have the doctor intervene in this.

My doula came to the hospital at 1pm. 

Wait. Back up. I had a DOULA? 

Less than three weeks prior, I was at FriendSpeak reading with my Taiwanese girls.

A new worker showed up and wanted to learn the ropes, so she sat with us as we read together.

I was already a week past my due date, and she asked if I was using Tiffany (another girl at church) as my doula.

I told her that we couldn't afford anything extra like that.

She said that she was a doula in training and that she would love to assist me, as it would be her first birth to assist. 

In my life, as a general rule, I don't say no to free things.

Shannon Josephson was a God-send! 

She helped me labor without an epidural until 4pm. 

She would apply pressure to my hips in different places, and it would really reduce the pain. 

It was amazing!

But I knew an epidural was in my future.

It made me even question why I said yes to a doula in the first place - but I'm so glad I did.

I couldn't have done this without her.

(She's in the black shirt in this pic.)

I SLOWLY progressed throughout the day, enjoying the comfort of the epidural.

Nurse Jana relieves Nurse Claudine at 7:30pm.

Nurse Jana is all about changing my positions to help little Garrett along.

She is much more accepting of the doula, which is so great.

Finally, at 11pm, I get to push.

The question at that point is, "What day will Garrett be born?"

I should have known...

Three hours of pushing later, 

with help all around 

(Eric and Mom at my shoulders crunching me forward, 

Shannon and Nurse Jana at my legs crunching me backward),

our little HUGE bundle of joy arrived.

My first words were, "He's so heavy!"

9 pounds 11 ounces was what they quoted us in the room, 

but the official weight in the nursery was 9 pounds 8 ounces. 

Still. 

Huge.

I was exhausted. 

I could hardly lift my head to look at him. 

I hadn't eaten since Monday night (and it was Wednesday morning now).

I was an explosion of emotions and I couldn't stop shaking.

Until Garrett was on me skin to skin. 

Those were precious times.

Poor Eric had contracted a sinus infection from some ambitious yard work that weekend.

So he had to wear a mask.

And he had to help me push, and sleep in between contractions.

But he was there.

And that's all that mattered.

When Garrett was born, my mom told me later that she recognized him.

He looked just like my little brother's baby pictures.

The nurses kept saying how they had never seen so much blonde hair.

All of the blonde babies are bald!

He has a non-cone-shaped head,

a 0.0 on the jaundice scale,

and is absolutely perfect.

Those two weeks of extra cooking did this boy some good!

I will say, however, that with the next one, we're not waiting so long.

We joke that I birthed a toddler!

My next post will be all about how birthing a baby this big has challenges of its own.

Like my body trying to feed him.

We're working on it.

Overall, though, we couldn't be more blessed.