She’s here! (Birth details enclosed. Not too gory though.) April 27, 2007

Miss Sarah Elisabeth arrived on Saturday, April 14th at 7:46pm. She weighed in at 7.4 1/4 oz and was 20 inches long.

I lost my mucus plug on April 13th, but didn’t get too excited as it could mean labor was imminent, or that I could be sitting around on, oh, say the 27th of April waiting to have a baby. I woke up at 1AM on the 14th with contractions that were 6-8 minutes apart. At about 4AM, the contractions were 5 minutes apart and we went to the hospital because the doctor on call told us to. The nurse on duty said she didn’t think I was in active labor because I was “too nice” (bitch) and according to her check I was MAYBE 1 cm dilated and was at a -3 station (meaning Sarah was nowhere near my pelvis). Since I had been 2 cm dilated and -1 station that week at my OB appointment, I thought something not “too nice” about the nurse. She had us walk for about an hour, during which my contractions shortened to 3 minutes apart. After an hour, she pronounced there was no change, gave me a sleeping pill to help me sleep through contractions, and sent us home.

Yeah. Sleeping through contractions? Didn’t happen.

I was terrified of Linnea seeing me in pain, so I hid in our bedroom for most of my labor while my Mom and M took care of Nea. Finally, at 2 PM I told M, “Screw this. I need a fucking epidural. Was that not nice enough to get them to let me stay at the hospital this time?!”

Apparently: it was. I was 4 cm dilated, they hooked me up to some IV fluids because I was dehydrated, and when I was 5 cm dilated I got my epidural. Sweet, sweet medicine. And, since the sleeping pill was still floating around in my system: I promptly passed out. Which was a good thing, since the only thing M could find to watch on television was “MadMax” or golf. I actually slept until the nurse woke me up by saying, “Beege, honey? You’re complete, and the baby is RIGHT THERE. I need you to not do anything, OK? No sneezing, no coughing, and if the urge to push comes you need to call me right away, OK? I’m going to go call the doctor and get her here immediately.” I smiled, nodded, and I think I dozed off again…I’m not sure. It’s hazy until they had my feet in the stirrups.

I pushed three times and Sarah was here. 🙂

It was funny, because when I’d gone to see my doctor on the Wednesday before she was born, Dr. D made the comment, “Gee, it would be nice if she could be born on Saturday. I have this ‘thing’ at my in-laws on Saturday, and I really don’t want to go. I’d come in on my weekend off to deliver her if she was born on Saturday.” but then she checked me and said, “Oh, you won’t go on Saturday. There’s nothing happening.” Sarah, apparently, had other ideas and had decided to help dear old Dr. D out. When she walked in to do the delivery I smiled at her and said, “So, how much is getting out of a ‘thing’ at your in-laws worth to you?”

She’s a very mellow baby, which is nice, since her big sister is a bit on the high maintenance end of things. Nobody could decide who she looked like (apparently my insistence that she just looked like herself wasn’t good enough) until I pulled out Linnea’s baby book and we all went, “Daaaaaaaamn. They’re totally related.” I flipped over all the pics of Nea and wrote her name on the back of them while I was SURE they were Linnea, that’s how much they look alike.

Sarah likes to nurse constantly, which has led to a rather sore pair of nipples and a rather cranky Mommy, who is sort of tired of listening to Daddy complain about how exhausted he is–particularly after Mommy spends most of the night awake, nursing, and listening to Daddy snore like a steam shovel. I finally had a post-partum meltdown last night and told my family, “Y’all are ALL working my last nerve.” (I like being married to a Texan. It’s given me handy gramatical tools that I simply didn’t have as a PNWer. Post-partum meltdowns just sound better if you throw some “y’alls” in there…)

 Linnea is adjusting well to big sisterhood (well, other than the fact that she tried to poke Sarah in the head with a fork last night…) and as long as I make sure she and I have some one-on-one time every day: she’s really quite good. She LOVES Sarah, is protective and possessive, and her first question whenever she comes home from school or wakes up from sleep is, “Where is Sarah?” She kisses her all the time, and really the only problem we have had is that she wants to be SO CLOSE to Sarah she sort of squishes her. The first time she held Sarah, she said, “Mama! She smells so good! Like lyin’ in the grass!” It’s my new favorite Mom story, because it’s just so beautiful. Well, that, and the one where M asked Linnea why she didn’t go poopy in the big girl potty, and Linnea said, “Daddy. It was so big. It was like a POTATO.”

So now the Familia Beege has one more person in it. And it’s good. 🙂 Like lyin’ in the grass.

Stop looking at me! April 8, 2007

Gads. You forget the joys of late pregnancy. Which is probably a good thing, because if you remembered them: no one would ever do it more than once.

I have been put on bedrest (hence the silence on the blog-front), due to a single very high blood pressure reading at the doctor’s. My doc doesn’t mess around. The first day and a half of bedrest? Hev-UN. The following 11 days? Hell. I’m bored out of my freaking gourd. My mum flew out from Washington a week ago to help us out (‘cuz hello? Bedrest and a 3-year-old? Really, really, REALLY not compatible), and luckily my BPs have been well-within the healthy range and my doc said, “Um, OK, you can take your bedrest on the couch and you can get up and walk some every day.” Which has helped immensely in the mental health department.

Except that EVERYONE is ready for me to have this kid. I’m ready. M is ready. I can’t sneeze without Mum getting all excited. My Dad (who is in Washington until Sarah makes her appearance) misses his wife and is more than ready for his granddaughter to make her appearance so that he can come out to Minnesota and see Mom again. Everytime I see anyone, they always say, “You had that baby yet?” I just smile and shake my head, although inside I’m thinking, “Nope, but apparently you had that lobotomy I’ve always thought you needed since you didn’t even NOTICE the huge freaking belly that enters a room a good five minutes before I do.” 

*sigh* She’s dropped. I’m effacing. I’m dilating. I’m getting ready to have her. But it’s just not going to be soon enough…