Julianna

We are ALL so happy that our baby girl is finally here!  

Julianna Lee

Tuesday, June 21st, 2011 

8:29pm 

8lbs 2 oz 

19.5" long

And here is her story:

This pregnancy has not been an easy one either emotionally or physically for me.   With fear that she would NEVER decide to be born I went to my doctor's appointment Tuesday morning.  I had been positive that our sweet baby would come early.  How could she not?  I was HUGE, and I knew from those chubby cheeks I saw in the last ultrasound that baby girl was going to be huge too if she didn't come soon!  I had my doctor strip my membranes in hopes that it would get something started.  However, he stated that there wasn't really a whole lot for him to do.  I pretty much left without much hope of things going quickly.  I was resigned that I would be back again in a week...this time overdue!  My doctor did give me the option of going over to the hospital right then and he would break my water, but after talking to Brent we decided that I probably didn't need any extra pain added on top of normal labor and delivery.  So I returned home somewhat downtrodden.

Not much occurred the rest of the morning.  We did go and do a little grocery shopping.  I had planned on running a couple of more errands later in the afternoon, but I was so tired (did I mention that I didn't sleep at all the night before) that I laid down and took a 2 hour nap.  It was glorious.  When I woke up I wasn't feeling very well.  Just uncomfortable.  There wasn't anything specific to make me think I was in labor.  I just didn't feel very well, and really, how is that any different from how I've felt on just about any given day in the last 9 months!  

Around 4:00 I decided to give Brent a call.  Although I wasn't really having any contractions I thought it would be a good idea for him to bring his work home with him so that he could work from home on Wednesday because I was beginning to feel like that might be the big day!  By the time he arrived home around 5:00 I had had 4 or 5 contractions.  Nothing major, but definitely real contractions.  At the rate they were progressing I was sure that this was going to be a VERY VERY VERY long labor and that it would last most of the night and probably into the next day.  Camden has gymnastics on Tuesday from 6-7and I seriously considered going with Brent and Camden just for something to do.  The contractions weren't so bad that I couldn't sit there through them.  Brent didn't think that was wise and encouraged me to stay home.  So I did and commenced the all important job of packing for the hospital.  The girls also had a makeup karate class that night that was supposed to start at 8.  The beginner class started at 7, and I had them get ready early, and I was going to take them over to their class.  However, the contractions were getting strong enough that I needed to stop what I was doing and concentrate a little harder on them.  I decided that that wasn't the ideal condition to be in to drive them to their class.  When Brent and Camden arrived home from gymnastics I had Brent drop the girls off at their karate class so that they could at least go to part of it.  While he was gone (keep in mind that it is a 10 minute tops round trip) the contractions all of a sudden picked up in intensity and frequency.  In fact, when he came in I was on the ground leaning over a stool and told him that I just couldn't do this this time that we were leaving for the hospital and I was getting an epidural.  If I hadn't decided that I was going to have an epidural there is no chance that we would have left for the hospital yet.  After all it was only going to be a 10 minute drive instead of 25 like we were used to.  By 8:00 we were on our way to the hospital to have a baby!

As soon as we arrived I very loudly declared that they needed to call the anesthesiologist right away because I wanted an epidural.  Their response was simply that they needed to get me registered and checked first.  I assured them that their first job needed to be to get me that epidural!  They asked me to sit in the waiting room while they retrieved a wheel chair for me.  I am telling you it was an ETERNITY until that wheelchair showed up.  Brent assures me that they were very fast and that I didn't wait very long at all.  I'm still not sure I believe him!  As soon as they got me to the labor and delivery room there were nurses all over.  There were two undressing me while three others were getting all of the baby stuff out.  I kept telling them that they didn't need to worry about the baby stuff that they needed to get me that epidural!!  I was already fully dialated and the only thing that was keeping the baby in was that my water hadn't broken yet.  The nurses told me that there was no chance I was getting an epidural.  So I proceeded to tell them that that wasn't okay with me.  I would take a spinal block....morphine....knock me unconscious...whatever would work.



Thankfully my doctor was on call and even more than that was still in the hospital.  It didn't take him long to get there.  He broke my water at 8:26 and after waiting for what seemed an eternity for another contraction to come along so that I could push...our sweet angel was born at 8:29. 

She is very sweet but definitely a crier.  We don't have a lot of pictures of her that first night.  Recovery from this little one has definitely been more difficult than with the others.  We'll blame it on....uh...I'm way too old!  Anyway, Brent went home to get some sleep around 12:30, and I was so week the whole night that I couldn't even lift her out of her little crib that night.