Apparently Jay had already caught the baby bug again too.
Driving home from a dinner with his family, he out-of-nowhere turned to me and said, "I want to have another baby." And just like that, the decision had been made.
As soon as we got home, we flushed all of my pills down the toilet. The goalie had once again been pulled from the game.
After some discussion, we both acknowledged that it may take a few months, and that we shouldn't get our hopes up. We weren't "trying" but we weren't "preventing" either. We were honestly expecting another 6 months like our last experience.
Were we ever wrong!
Three weeks later, my period was late. I couldn't possibly be pregnant already! But, despite thinking it was impossible, we bought a test.
PREGNANT.
What the heck? How could it have been that easy? Before we really even gave ourselves time to process the possibility of a second child, a second child was on the way.
Any early ultrasound confirmed, we were indeed expecting. Baby #2 was due November 23rd, 2010.
A few weeks later, we let Cameron make the announcement for us.
"I'm not LION, I'm going to be a BIG BROTHER!"
This pregnancy wasn't quite as easy as my first, but it was in no way something I would have complained about. Sure, I was sick a bit more, but it was manageable.
This time around I KNEW it was a girl. It was like everywhere I turned, there was a cute pair of shoes or a big flowery headband calling my name. Baby had to be a girl.
I could have skipped my 20-week ultrasound. That's how convinced I was that we were having a girl. And yet, I was afraid that if I told me husband JUST how sure I was, I would jinx myself. So I kept all of my baby girl planning to myself.
And sure enough, at our July 2010 ultrasound, my intuition was confirmed. BABY GIRL!
I guess you could say Cameron named his baby sister. Jay and I couldn't agree on anything. One night, while we were all just hanging out, watching Wall.E (Cameron's FAVORITE movie at the time), the name conversation came up again for the 9,787th time. But this time, Cameron gave his two cents. Suddenly he said, "Eva". Now, if you're familiar with the movie, Wall.E falls for a robot named Eve, but always pronounces her name as "Eva". Surprisingly, we both loved it and basically the rest is history. We finally had a name! Baby girl was going to be named Eva Florence. Florence as homage to Jay's grandmother.
The rest of the pregnancy went as well as anyone could hope. I was healthy. Baby girl was healthy. Another complaint free pregnancy. Until I hit 39 weeks....
I had only made it to 39 weeks with our first, and I hadn't even considered being pregnant longer then that. I wanted to be done.
39 weeks and 1 day.
39 weeks and 2 days.
At 39 weeks and 3 days I had a standard OB appointment. I opted to have my membranes stripped, in hopes of jump starting labor.
24 hours later, I was convinced I'd be pregnant forever. I was so convinced that I was no where near the end, that I encouraged my husband go to a WILD hockey came that night, but I agreed to hang out with Cameron at my in-law's house, in case I spontaneously went into labor.
The night was uneventful. Jay got home around 10:30 p.m. from the game, and the three of us went home.
BOOM! What the hell heck was that?! We hadn't even been home for an hour when I was hulk-stomped with my first contraction. And these were no joke. Painful and three minutes apart from the very beginning! I guess she was just waiting for Daddy before getting the show on the road... and she wasn't wasting time.
I had wanted to labor at home for as long as possible like I had the first time, but the immediate intensity of the contractions freaked me out. You could say I panicked. After only two hours of laboring at home, I wanted to go to the hospital. So we called my mother to stay with Cameron (since it was the middle of the night) and we made our way to our local hospital.
By 4 a.m. I had gotten an epidural. And this time around, I was actually able to take a nap.
I woke up at 6:30 to a dull pinch in my right hip. It was a contraction. Right then and there I was sure that my epidural was wearing off or not working at all, but then again I hadn't had an epidural for this long before (see previous labor story), so who was I to stay what was normal and what wasn't.
By 7:30, the contractions had continued to get stronger again. Before I really had a chance to assess my pain, the doctor asked if I was ready for her to break my water. YES. I was ready to be done with labor. I was ready to hold my daughter. YES, please break my water!
I should have known better. Having your water break is a total game changer, at least for me. Things take off so fast after that. And the pain was suddenly so intense, that it was as if my "epidural" didn't exist! PANIC.
I could feel EVERYTHING. Again, not something I was completely prepared for. After insisting to my nurse that something was "wrong" with my epidural, and having the anesthesiologist come back to double check his work, I realized that amongst the pain, my body was starting to push. Pain or not, I had no choice but to do it on my own.
The bright side to feeling everything, is that I knew exactly where Eva was, and how effective my pushing was. Four pushes later, baby girl was in my arms! After carrying her for 39 weeks and 5 days, I finally got to see her sweet little face!
I melted. I looked at Jay, and literally saw him fall in love with his daughter right before my eyes.
Eva Florence
November 21st, 2010
8:31 a.m.
7 lbs 4 ozs
21.5 inches long
She was beautiful. We were so blessed.
No comments:
Post a Comment