Birth Story

 Kellen is here!  He's been such a joy to have in our lives.  It already feels like he's been a part of our family forever.  He came at 39 weeks and 1 day.  Being that Farrah was late by 4 days I figured he'd be late too but he had other plans :)
I went in Wednesday morning for my weekly Doctor's appt and when the medical assistant took my blood pressure she said it was a little high.  She said I'd just meet with the Doctor like planned and then she'd take it again after the appt.  I met with the Doctor.  She didn't seemed concerned.... it wasn't that high.  My husband had planned on dropping Farrah off at preschool and heading straight to work while I was at my appt so I was surprised when the medical assistant knocked and said my husband was there.  So glad he ended up coming!  So anyhoo I finished the appointment and went to have her re-take my blood pressure.  She took it and said "Well it's the same so she wants you to go down to Labor and Delivery and have them monitor you now."  My husband and I looked at each other a little dumbfounded.  We weren't expecting that.  So we walked down still not thinking much.  I thought they'd just monitor me for a bit and send me home.  They hooked me up to have my blood pressure automatically taken every 5 minutes.  It kept going up.  They ran blood work thinking I might have pre-ecclampsia.  The Doctor came back in telling me the results looked great and that..... she paused when she saw my latest blood pressure reading.  She was ready to send me home until she saw the latest blood pressure numbers.  Now they wanted to induce.  Again... dumbfounded.  Wasn't expecting to bring a baby home then.
So they sent us over to a delivery room and started a medication that is supposed to soften the cervix.  It's a pill you take every 4 hours for up to 5 doses.  So I had the first dose and I started having some contractions.  Nothing super intense but definitely painful.  Then they died down and it was time for the next dose.  At this point it was about 8:30pm and my family were there to hang out for a while.  The next Doctor that was on for the night came in and told me that this medication could take a while.  Up to 3 days..... 3 days?  Ummmm I know labor is supposed to take a while but 3 days?  At this point my family decided to head home and they'd be back in the morning.  My husband went home to let the dog out (thankfully Farrah was staying with friends).  They gave me some pain medication in my IV to help me sleep so that I could rest up for this long haul.  I think I had only been asleep for maybe 5 minutes when it seemed like the pain medication was starting to wear off and all of a sudden I felt my water break.  The nurse came in and was shocked to see how fast I had gone from 1-5 centimeters.  My husband came back shortly after that thankfully, because my contractions just started going crazy.  They were so intense and less than a minute apart.  At this point I was calling for the sweet relief of an epidural.  Thankfully he came relatively quickly and I didn't have to endure those terrible pains for longer than 45 mins or so.  As soon as I got the epidural they told me to sleep because I'd need the rest to push.  Sure enough, after about 5 minutes of sleep I woke up feeling the urge to push.  I called the nurse in and she said she was hesitant to check me because there was no way I would be fully dilated that fast.  The midwife came in and said she'd check me, and sure enough 10 centimeters!  I had gone from 1-10 centimeters in about 3 hours in what was supposed to take 3 days.  I pushed for 15 minutes and he was out.  He arrived at 2:16am on Thursday. He weighed 8lbs 1oz and was 21 inches long. 
Life as a mom of 2 has been great so far!  I'll update you more next time.  I believe this post has been long enough!  But here are some pictures of our new little man.