More pictures and a video

Arthur got to watch us eat our fancy celebration meal from the hospital.  :)  He stared at the chocolate cake for a long time!

Eleanor's first response to meeting her brother:

He's here!!!

Arthur Stephenson

10.4.2011  9:40 AM

9 lbs, 1 oz

22" long

I went in on Monday night to be induced with Cervadil, which didn't really do much.  The pitocin started at 6:00 AM this morning, and by 8:00 AM I was at 4 cm.  Yay, time for the epidural!  Things were starting to get uncomfortable by this point, but totally bearable.  The anesthesiologist came in and got everything ready, then asked if I was on any medications besides vitamins.  Yes, I told her, I've been taking baby aspirin.  (My OB had me start this back in the first trimester to reduce the risk of placental blood clots, like what happened with Ada.)  Her jaw dropped, and she informed us that there is a high risk of bleeding in the spinal cord if I've taken aspirin in the last 7-10 days.  We quickly decided not to go that route, and I ended up laboring completely drug free.  

Turns out, I am NOT a fan of natural childbirth.  Especially not when the baby is 9lb, 1oz and has a 15" head.

We did turn off the pitocin since my water had already broken on its own anyway, and that helped make the contractions more bearable.  The pushing part was the worst part and took about 30 minutes.  On the positive side, I will say that Arthur was definitely more alert than Eleanor at birth (I had an epidural with her) and I had no trouble getting up and walking around soon afterwards.  But would I choose the epidural if I could go back and change things?  YES!

Oh, and I have to add that Hunter was amazing and I could NOT have done this without him.  :)  The nurse I had was pretty awesome too.  Also, the pediatrician here checked Arthur out and said that he was perfectly healthy.  He has already nursed like a champ several times....whew!

Now, for some pictures!

Finishing up with his first bath

Big sister is ready to meet her brother!

The only thing Eleanor said?

"Want to put him back," over and over while pointing to the bassinet.  Oh boy!

She was much more interested in the cool furniture.

Proud Grandma and Grandpa

My sweet boy

Opening her present from Arthur

The book was way more exciting than the baby!

Ready for our October pumpkin!

First of all, I had to share these fun pictures that we just took this afternoon!

(Of course Hunter made me crop out his face from all of them.)

Eleanor wanted to be in on the action with her stuffed gorilla.  :)

Second of all, I am an aunt again!  Micah Light Quattlebaum was born this morning at 9:17, weighing 6 lbs 14 oz and 19.25 inches long.  He is very cute!  It looks like he's probably going to be a day older than his cousin.  My sister had to have a c-section because of blood pressure issues, but she and baby are healthy and doing well so far.

Finally, I am at the hospital all ready to go!  All I've done so far is give a bunch of blood and answer a million questions.  Hunter went home to eat dinner and help put Eleanor to bed (his mom and step-father are here watching her), but will be back in a while.  Honestly, this is kind of like a vacation.  (so far, hah!) Somebody just brought me dinner, I don't have to wash any dishes, I can watch tv or do whatever I want...it's actually kind of nice.  I do miss my baby though.  I thought I was going to be coming in tonight at 7:00, but at 1:30 I found out I had to be here at 4:00.  I got a little emotional when I realized I was about to say goodbye to Eleanor for the last time before she becomes a big sister and everything changes!  Anyway, so far, so good.  :)

Birthdays

Fall is a busy time for birthdays in our family!  Between Hunter's family and my family - that's us, Eleanor, our siblings, their kids, our parents, and everybody's spouses - 10 of the 19 of us have birthdays between September 10 and November 11.  Very soon, that number will go up to 12 out of 21!

My sister is being induced on Sunday night and I am being induced on Monday night (unless Arthur decides to come sooner...please?), but there's a decent chance that both of these babies will arrive on Tuesday.  For my sister's sake I hope baby Micah comes earlier than that, but this is her first and she's 37 weeks so the doctor has told her to be prepared for it to take 48 hours.  So, Arthur and Micah might share an October 4 birthday!  Pretty exciting!

Scheduled an induction

I had another appointment today and I am still at 2 cm; the same as last week.  That was a bit discouraging to me since I've had a lot of contractions since then, but I knew it was a possibility.  (Although I had a dream last night that I went to my appointment and was at 9 cm - now that would have been interesting!)  I asked the doctor to strip my membranes, which she did, so I'm hoping maybe that will lead to me going into labor naturally.  (Here's an explanation if you don't know what that is and want to know...forgive me if it's TMI.)  She didn't seem particularly optimistic, but apparently it has worked for several of my friends.  I really hope Arthur arrives on his own in the next few days.

BUT, if he doesn't, I am scheduled to go in for an induction on Monday night.  Is this medically necessary?  No, not really.  Did my OB push for it?  Again, not really, though she is definitely supportive.  We're also not doing it because we're worried that Arthur is too big or because it's convenient for scheduling somebody to be with Eleanor.  Hunter and I had a long talk last night and we decided to ask for it because we are scared.  

We are scared of losing another baby, and the risk of stillbirth increases in the last few weeks of pregnancy.  I have lost count of the number of times in the past few weeks that I've woken up in the middle of the night and started panicking because Arthur wasn't kicking me right that second.  I change positions, poke him some, and start letting my thoughts run wild until he finally kicks me and I relax.  Hunter asks me several times a day if I've felt him kicking lately, so I know he's right there with me.  We have both recently heard several stories about babies being lost late in the third trimester due to placenta problems (which apparently is what happened with Ada, though much earlier) or cord accidents.  Are we really at risk of these things happening in the next week or two with Arthur?  Probably not.  But we've been there before, and are just ready to hold a live, healthy baby in our arms.

The good news about the induction is that there's a chance I won't even have to have pitocin.  With Eleanor I got Cervadil the night before, and by 4:30 AM my water broke and I started having contractions on my own.  The pitocin started at 6:30 AM, and I went from 2cm to 8cm in the next 2 hours.  Eleanor was born at 9:30 AM.  I talked to my OB about it and she said that there's a good chance the Cervadil will be all that I need.  So, if I do end up being induced, I'm at least hoping for that!

Eleanor's first bad dream

Well, I don't know if last night was actually Eleanor's first bad dream ever, but it was certainly the first one that woke her up screaming that she was then able to tell us about.  Around 11:00 last night she scared us to death because she woke up screaming at the top of her lungs.  I couldn't quite make out what she was saying, but I'm pretty sure I heard "scary! scary!"  We both ran up to her room and Hunter picked her up and held her.  She said something about a green snake in her bed, and pretty quickly fell back asleep.

This morning when she woke up, I went up to get her.  She was her usual happy self, but she said something like, "There are snakes in the bed!"  I looked under the covers and said, "No, there are no snakes.  I don't see any snakes in your bed."  "Green snakes in the bed, biting Eleanor!"  "Did the snakes bite you?"  "Yes!"  "And did that make you sad?"  "Yes!  Snakes hurt Eleanor!"  Of course I checked her bed to make sure there was nothing weird that could have been poking her or something, but there was nothing unusual.  Right before she went to bed last night we read a book about a mouse who didn't like his house and went around to a bunch of different animals' homes to try to sleep with them.  He didn't want to stay with the green snakes though, because he was scared of them.  I'm guessing this was the cause!

Poor thing...what a bad dream!

Happy Fall!

Pretending to be a kitten with her mittens

(She loves the song "The Three Little Kittens")