I had a baby!

This is my beautiful baby girl, Abigail Jo, just moments after she was born. It's been 3 weeks now and I can't believe how time has flown. Maybe it's the lack of sleep that makes it seem like it's gone so quickly. This little girl is sleeping on my chest right now, so I'm trying to be quick with this blog, but there is so much to say. Firstly, I am so grateful that the Lord has given me this opportunity to raise this wonderful little girl. I'm in awe that I would be trusted with one of His children here on the earth. Wow, it's almost too crazy to think about.

I was scheduled to be induced, which looking back, I loved. I didn't have to go through the "labor at home" thing and the day before I went it I was able to really clean the house, do some last minute shopping, and even went out to eat one last time with Vinnie (we picked Texas Roadhouse). We went in at 7:30 in the morning and got checked in. Right away I got changed into a hospital gown, which feels rather awkward with the open back and no undies on. I had a pitocin IV started soon there after. Dr England came in at 9ish and broke my water. Um...that is a gross feeling...blah! Contractions were starting to pick up and around noon I got an epidural. Which, I was always planning on getting, but as he was doing it, I couldn't help but think of how this guy is putting a needle in my spine...hope he doesn't mess up or hope I don't wiggle around too much. It was probably irrational to fear getting paralyzed because this guy puts in epidurals all the time, but yeah, the fear was there. No worries, I can walk still. The epidural made things fabulous, no more pain. I'm surprised that there are people who do it without, but more power to you. Sometime later...in the early afternoon, got a sudden wave of nausea. I had someone warn me that throwing up is possible, but I guess I hadn't taken them seriously. I should have. I vomited...a lot...all over the front of me and all over the bed. Disgusting. At that point I had lost all hope of modestly. The poor nurse who came in and cleaned me up. I felt so miserable. But, on the upside, I did learn where the little blue vomit bags are kept. And I used them...often.

Suddenly, around 5 it was time to start pushing. And wouldn't you know it, I had to start coughing. Apparently that helped to move the little miss out, as did all the vomiting (in the blue bags still). The coughing and throwing up probably did more than the pushing did. But, finally it was over and the doctor was putting this gooey little baby on my chest. I have a picture of this moment, but I'm not putting it up. The look on my face is not at all pretty. It's more of a "ugh...she's slimey..."

I ended up with a small tear and an episiotomy, both got stitched up and were not fun to recover from. Fortunately, the majority of the pain of that was gone by a week and a half. It was nice having the epidural though because I couldn't feel a lot of that pain for a while. Oh, and totally got one of those blow up donut guys to sit on. Very nice. Before I went to the hospital, I spent a lot of time obsessing about what to pack. I only took one bag, a pillow, and my laptop, but I packed too much. Next baby I'm just taking: my pillow, shower stuff (enough just for one shower), nursing/sleeping bra, face cleansing cloth, maybe a little makeup, socks, tablet guy, and the camera...I'll just wear home what I wore to the hospital, oh, and take stuff for the baby obviously. But, I just ended up taking stuff I did not need, and I didn't like that.