Carrie's Story

Well, I know I promised to write on Monday, but hopefully you'll all forgive me. As you might guess, I've been a little preoccupied. :) So here is the story of Carrie's grand entrance.

(There are pictures at the bottom, if you don't want to read the whole story and just want to see how dang cute she is)

We checked into the hospital on Thursday the 22nd at 4:30 in the afternoon for me to be induced. I got into my room, answered all the questions and was waiting to be hooked up to my pitocin to get things going. When I was admitted, I was 3cm dialated. I had never met the doctor who was on call from my office that day (we've only been here a month) and she wrote my orders and ran off to do a surgery. The nurse came back in the room and said "Ok, we're going to start you on some Cytotec (not pitocin) and see if it does anything for you." ... I started to cry. I had spoken with a different doctor in my office and we had decided that Cytotec (a cervical ripening agent, taken orally in pill form) was not the best idea for me. It was "unpredictable", "took longer" and "sometimes didn't do anything to put me in labor at all". I had been set on pitocin and was frustrated that the doctor I'd never even met had changed my "plan".

But since the doctor had gone to do surgery we just had to go with it. The Cytotec actually did give me a little kick start and I started having contractions about every 4 or 5 minutes. after four hours, I was supposed to get another dose, but my contractions were too close together (every 3-4 minutes) and I was still only 3cm. We decided to just sit and wait to see if I did anything on my own. By about 10pm I was having to focus and breath through every contraction even though they weren't too painful yet. At 1am, I was having hard, painul contractions every 2-3 minutes and I was still at 3cm...

We finally started pitocin at 1am hoping it would help me progress. for the next 6 hours every contraction was ridiculous, and Justin was at my side reminding me how to breath. At 7am, the doctor came in to check me and I WAS STILL AT 3CM!! Needless to say, I cried again. She broke my water (weird feeling) and said I could have my epidural even though I was only a 3.

My nurse called the anesthesiologist and around 8, he poked his head in the room and said, "I have to go to surgery, the patient is in the OR and they're waiting for me." My amazing nurse said "Oh no!, she is not waiting an hour, she needs her epidural now. They can wait for you." He left the room and both my mom and the nurse followed him to make sure he wasn't leaving. He was just grabbing his cart from the hall and he came and gave me my epidural. !!! [Insert Hallelujah Chorus Here] !!!

In an hour, I was at 5cm, two more hours and I was at 9cm. Apparently, I just needed to relax. Around 12:30 I started pushing and after a few contractions, the nurse told me to stop because we needed the doctor there (she was out to lunch...) About 12:50, the doctor got there and after only 5 or 6 contractions worth of pushing, Carrie arrived at 1:07pm!

They put her up on my belly and I immediately got "made fun of" for drying her off. I guess you can take the mom out of the NICU but you can't take the NICU out of the mom. She weighed 6lbs, 4oz and was 20 1/4 inches long.

Since I've written a book now, I'll write more about since we've been home in a later post. She is a wonderfully pleasant baby and we're enjoying having her home with us.

Me covered with cold washcloths (I was burning up, everyone else was freezing)

She's here! She's here!

6lbs, 4oz, 20 1/4 inches long

Proud Daddy

Happy Family