Hannah Lillian's Birthday

I'm not very good about journaling with my blog. I'm going to try and be better about telling the story along with the pictures. I figured a good place to start would be journaling about Hannah's birth. When I was pregnant with her my doctors would ask about my other births and pregnancies. As it got closer to her due date friends and aquaintances would ask how my births have gone with the other kids. I guess the thinking behind this is to know what to expect. Well, each one of our kids has their very own unique birth story. You never know what to expect when it comes to me giving birth, and Hannah is no different. She also has her very own unique story. One thing that has been constant is that I have never made it to a due date, until Hannah. Manny had been gone for his job and it looked like he was going to be able to come back home for her birth. We were so excited that he was going to be able to be here, so he came home a little more than a week before her due date just to be on the safe side. We just weren't sure how long he would get to stay home for. So, my very nice and compassionate doctor (who I'm sure deals with this kind of situation often) decided to induce me on my due date so Manny wouldn't miss the birth. Monday, Feb. 15th we went to the hospital for me to be induced. We got there at noon and they finally started the pitocin at 3:00 p.m. We were so excited. Everybody figured since it was my 6th baby that everything should move along very quickly. I had never been induced before and didn't know what to expect. Many hours of watching the Olympics and many contractions later there was no change. Absolutely no change at all. At midnight they decided to turn the pitocin off, let me get some sleep, and start it again in the morning. That was a very long night in the hospital. The morning finally came, I ate a big breakfast, and by 7:00 a.m. the pitocin was back on. (You know it's a long day when you get into Men's Curling with the Olympics.) After only a couple of hours I had dialated from a 2 to a 3 so we were thinking that something was actually going to happen. At 3:00 p.m. I was still a 3. It was so frustrating knowing that all the contractions that I was having weren't doing anything. I was ready to go for the C-Section at that time, but my doctor mentioned trying a new bag of pitocin. So, we started a new bag of pitocin, started at the lowest dose and raised the dose every 15 minutes. I was having some really good contractions and I had hope that they were doing something. Around 7:30 p.m. the contractions started to taper off and eventually went away all together. At that time the doctor's were changing shifts and so we had to wait. At 9:00 p.m. the doctor came in and told me that he wasn't comfortable having me on the pitocin at such a high dose with having a previous C-Section. I told him that I had already decided that I wanted to go with the C-Section. He checked me just for the heck of it and I was still a 3. Seriously, 30+ hours on pitocin with contractions and I was only a 3!!! They had me prepped and ready to go so fast for the surgery and before we knew it we were off to the O.R. We had gotten to know quite a few of the nurses by that time that a lot of them started coming in the room and helping to get me ready. At 10:11 P.M. we heard the most beautiful sound, her cry. While the doctor and nurses were all trying to guess her weight and commenting on her head of hair I was full of so many different wonderful emotions that nothing else mattered except listening to her cry. She stopped crying the second that they put her in Manny's arms. She still loves to be in her Daddy's arms and will turn her head to try and find him when she hears his voice.

She LOVED her first bath. When I had the C-Section with David I had to recover in the general area where people recover after surgery. I don't know what it's called. Manny and David were off somewhere else while I was by myself for 4 very long hours until they let me transfer to my room and be with them again. This time they let me recover in a room in Labor and Delivery with Manny and Hannah right by my side. Even though I was numb up to my armpits I got to nurse the baby and hold her and take in every moment.

We are all so happy that she is here, finally. Words really can't describe my emotions then or even now almost a week later. She is here, she's healthy, and she's perfect! To top it all off Manny gets to stick around a little bit longer than we thought. We don't know at this point in time when he will have to leave. We will just enjoy every minute that we get!

Hannah holding her Daddy's finger.