It's been a while

Wow, the wait is finally over for me. My baby girl was born yesterday at 10:40 AM after a long and crazy night. We arrived at the hospital the night before and the doctors confirmed that Jenn's membranes had ruptured and told us Jenn was going to be put on pitoscin (sp?). We asked to be started with a low dosage of pit. and have small increases as needed. The nurses were great and did just that. Unfortunately, after the last increase of pit at 4 AM, the contractions were coming so fast with hardly any breaks in between. Jenn did an awesome job managing the pain with the pattern breathing and the help of our doula, Kathy. The pain got to be overwhelming and Jenn opted to get the epidural around 6 AM after being checked and finding out that she was 6 cm dilated and 90% effaced. It took about an hour to get the epidural after we asked for it so that hour was UBER intense. Jenn was having some serious pain and all I could do is just sit there try to comfort her. After the epidural, everything was much better for all of us. Jenn didn't feel any pain and her contractions kept coming. The baby's heart rate never dropped below the "acceptable" range even with the intense contractions brought on by the pit. Anyway, a few hours later, Jenn was ready to push and my baby girl, Elena, was born at 10:40 AM. She weighed 8lb 2oz and the nurses said she had one of the biggest umbilical cord they'd ever seen. Elena is awesome. She took to breast feeding right away and sleeps like a champ.

I can't wait to take her home and spend all week with her. It's going to be tough going back to work next week.