Oh hey

I had a baby! Samuel Louis was born Friday March 30th at 4:32 AM, 6 days before his due date (Riley was 5 days early).

This kid is AMAZING. Not that I don’t love my firstborn, but she was not what is known as an easy baby. Even as a toddler she wants to be picked up and held and is extremely attached to me, it has been that way since day one. Part of me hoped the 2nd would be easier and holy wow, I’ve been rewarded. First off with the nursing….2 seconds after the kid was born he was crying and rooting like he was going to die if he didn’t nurse. As soon as I was stitched up and everyone left the room I said what the hay, let’s see if you’ll latch. I swear he knew what he was doing better than I did and was full on chugging in 10 seconds flat. It was about a week before Riley got there after multiple LC visits and calls, trips to the pedi for weight checks, and one ER visit for an IV.

Day one of life Phil had to go home to wrap up some work stuff and to check on my mom and Riley. I was tired and Sam was sleeping so I put him in the bassinet and napped almost 2 hours while he slept. In the bassinet! Alone! Riley screamed if not held 24/7, screamed! We took turns staying awake all night her entire first month so we all could get some sleep. Since being home he sleeps in his infant seat almost all day and will do a couple short stints in the bassinet at night. Phil and I both got 6 hours of sleep last night (not in a row, but 6 hours). Also, since the kid is a champion nurser, I don’t have to get up every 2 hours to feed him which makes a huge difference. He had gained enough at his appointment yesterday I was told to leave him if he slept 4-5 hours at a time and not worry about it.

He rarely cries unless he’s hungry. We can put him in his infant seat or swing and he looks around all content, he’ll sometimes even fall asleep sitting there. He also has yet to cry in the car (travel was a nightmare with Riley, still is sometimes!)

I know it’s still early and things will change, but I’m thankful for what we have so far. Yesterday I asked Phil why we thought this was so hard the first time around and he was like um because we weren’t sleeping and could never put the baby down ever.

Riley loves her brother, like loves. Right now he’s sleeping in the infant seat and she’s sitting with her feet under the chair eating her lunch. She has tried to feed him a number of things so far (telling him it’s yummy), brings him toys, and yells "mommy/daddy, baby hug!" any time he cries. When she visited us at the hospital she yelled at the nurses any time they did vitals on him and told them to give the baby to me. Sadly she was anti-mom for awhile, I don’t know if it’s because we left her or since I can’t pick her up, or just the adjustment of seeing me with the baby and nursing and whatnot, but yesterday was the first day she really acknowledged or got excited to see me when she woke up. She still asks for Phil to rock her before nap and bed, which makes me sad, but overall she’s adjusting well right now. She has become very interested in him nursing the last couple days. Yesterday when he unlatched I moved him upright to burp and Riley bent over super fast like she was going to try and latch on. Once before that she pointed and said "ah". She nursed quite a bit into my pregnancy so I wondered if she would be interested or remember when she saw him do it. I know some people will let their toddlers try and more often than not they don’t remember how to latch anyway, but we just tell her it’s baby’s milk.

And the obligatory birth story, definitely some TMI. Background – starting Tuesday I was having contractions that would wake me up around 1-3 AM and last until 6-7 AM before dying off. Early Thursday morning I lost my plug/had "the show" but contractions still died off. I would occasionally have one strong enough I had to stop and breathe through, but for the most part it still wasn’t going anywhere. I had Phil stay home Thurs just in case, but still took Riley to playgroup.

Unlike the 2 nights leading up to Thursday my contractions were actually regular and timeable after some accupressure and crawling around on my hands and knees all evening. I called around 11:30 on Thurs night to ask when I should come in and was told same as last time (2-3 mins apart, too intense to walk/talk through). I was hoping to make it to 7 AM when a midwife would be at the hospital (due to staffing they’re not on nights currently), but a couple hours later it became obvious that wasn’t going to happen. With Riley most of my labor happened after my water had already broken and was way more intense. Even though some of the contractions were tough it was not near what I remembered. I stood in front of the TV for awhile doing some Dancing for Birth moves, using my hypno imagery, and overall focusing on relaxing. I was getting a lot of pressure with each contraction which made me worry things might be moving faster than I thought, but the OB on call didn’t seem to think I was really in labor and she convinced me lol.

Around 2 AM contractions had been about 2 mins apart for an hour so I finally made the decision to wake Phil. I’d had a few contractions that made me feel like I  was going to split in two and I was starting to get shaky and hot flashy. He called his sister and I called the on call line again. I was told I could come in and get checked if I wanted, but they still didn’t seem convinced I needed to. As we were hanging up I told her my water had just broken and then she started taking my information lol. After that was the labor I remembered from last time, pretty miserable. Contractions weren’t even timeable, just one after another, it made for a lovely car ride and looooooong walk to L&D.

They didn’t make me go through triage since my water had broken and I was positive for group B strep. It was when we got to the room I wanted (with a nice double bed!) that things got bad. I had so much pressure it hurt to take one single step and every time I moved it spurred a contraction. The nurse couldn’t get the monitor to work and I was standing in the corner just wanting to sit down! She finally said we should choose a different room (bye awesome bed) so we went to the one Riley was born in. At that point it was apparent to me this kid was coming very soon and I felt like everyone else was moving in slow motion. I finally got hooked up to the monitors and maybe the 2nd contraction I had in the bed I told her my butt hurt lol. I hadn’t even been officially admitted or checked yet. She finally looked then and, oh hey, I was 10 cms and baby was on his way out. She very calmly hit the call button and told them to get everything ready because the baby was coming.

Pushing last time was an awesome relief….this time not so much. Luckily it only lasted 10 mins, but it was the first time between either of my labors that I screamed. It burned so bad and I swear his head was stuck forever. With Riley we had a lot more time and the midwife had stretched and massaged some ahead of time. The nurse and OB did a great job, though. They told me when to slow down and both kept trying to help stretch as fast as he was coming. I ended up with only one small tear, same as last time.

Baby boy weighed 8 lbs 10 oz and is 20 1/4 inches long. He cried t

he whole time they were cleaning me up and was rooting.like.crazy. As soon as they were done with me and everyone left he latched right on and was chugging, I could have cried I was so relieved. It was a good thing, too. He was born big for gestational age (39w1d) and his first glucose check wasn’t good. The 2 rechecks after nursing were fine so we made it over that obstacle. His face was really red and no one really knows why. They did some extra labs and they came back normal so that was good. The pedi that saw him prior to discharge said it may have been bruising from being delivered so fast. I never got the antibiotic I was supposed to during delivery, but he never spiked a fever or anything, so he didn’t end up being treated, either. The nurses all told me I was lucky I came in when I did! They were all impressed with the way I handled the labor, they kept saying everyone should have kids the way I did lol.

When Phil called his sister she said Riley woke up just before 4:30, Sam was born at 4:32. I thought that was pretty cool. She was really excited about auntie being at her house when she woke up and apparently was laughing hysterically when my mom got there a little while later. I worried about her for nothing 🙂

And as always, your reward for reading: