This afternoon Declan will be officially a week old. We had his first pediatrician’s appointment yesterday and things look to be going well.
I wound up having my epidural topped up three times and had several lots of 15-20 minutes without pain medication at all, which was not only hard on me but Mum and D who were with me as well because there wasn’t much of anything they could do to help.
My water broke at 7:15 a.m. after I’d been on cervadil all through the night, and so none of us had much sleep. Dr. R decided to let labor progress on it’s on for a while, and after a brief nap once the epidural was given to me by the wonderful Dr. B (whose praises we shall sing for ever) about 10:30 a.m. we started trying to push at around 2 p.m. or so, but by 3:15 it was becoming apparent we weren’t getting very far. We could see the baby’s head, but it wouldn’t move any further forward. Dr. R suggested we might have to go for a C-Section. We tried a bit more, but there was still no progress. I was exhausted, and we were worried that if we kept going much longer the baby would go into distress.
So, at 4:06 I was in surgery. D apparently got to see my liver, as well as the baby being born and the placenta coming out. The umbilical cord was around the baby’s shoulder when they got him out and he looked a little purple, but he started crying very quickly and continues to prove to us that he has very strong lungs.
I got to give the baby a kiss before they took him for procedures and D went with him for those while I was sewed up. I was freezing cold and had been for most of the surgery, my teeth were chattering, but the aneasthetist, Dr. B who had been wonderful throughout keeping everyone in good spirits singing to the radio in the O.R. and making jokes told me to go to sleep for a bit. They came back in and told us how much he weighed but I was asleep.
So, 9lbs 6oz, and the mark he had on his head from where he was stuck on my pelvis I don’t think there’s anyway even if I’d been bright eyed and bushy tailed we would have wound up not having to have a C-Section.
The first night was very tiring, because Declan was hungry but didn’t know how to nurse, and I was exhausted, and he kept pooping, of course, because he’d never had to before. D stayed with me, changing most of the diapers because I was so sore I couldn’t really do it.
It seemed like every twenty minutes we were being disturbed either by my IV going off, Declan waking up cranky/hungry/dirty, nurses coming in to check him or me…
D didn’t stay the next two nights because the cot they had for him was very painful on his back. The second night wasn’t so bad. Declan slept fairly well I was able to move around more. The nurses helped out, but the third night he was very cranky because of gas pain, and had slight jaundice, and I was also having pains because of the surgery, so it made everyone tired and uncomfortable and made for a very sleepless night.
Saturday they took out my staples and replaced them with steri-strips, and also the pediatrician wound up putting Declan on an IV for a while because he wasn’t jaundiced enough to be put under the lights. They took him to the nursery for a while, also, because I was so exhausted and he wasn’t feeding properly because of that and the IV. So, they gave him a little glucose water through a syringe, and we were able to come home at 4 p.m.
We’ve been managing okay. This week is kinda hard because D has radar training. So he’s winding up working 7 days straight and is pretty exhausted. He’s helping out where he can, but having to be up at 3 a.m. makes that tricky because he needs his sleep. D seems to be going one night good, one night bad as far as keeping us up all night crying and upset.
This morning I wound up having to change his entire bed because he pooped everywhere and then he got ticked off because he wound up having two sponge baths in a row because he peed all over himself and everything as I was getting him dressed again after the first one.
But we’ll survive…it’s just adjustment period for everyone.
