On July 19, we snapped a before picture real quick just to remember how HUGE I got, and we headed off to the hospital at noon so I could be induced. This was one week and a day earlier than his due date. Normally they don't induce you with your first pregnancy that early, but I was measuring ginormous....as in at 8 months, they did an ultrasound, and he was measuring in at approximately 7 pounds (plus or minus a pound). And they supposedly gain a pound each week in that last month. So even though he could be weighing 6 lbs at that time, he could also already be at 8 lbs. And I DID NOT want to have a c-section if I didn't have to. It kind of freaked the doctor out and he thought there was no way I could have this baby on my own.
So anyways, I got to be induced early. We went to the hospital, got all hooked up with the IV's, and waited. The contractions started, and weren't too painful, so I said no epidural yet. They started getting worse, but I could still stand the pain, so I still didn't get one. Hadley told me I was being dumb to not just get it before they start killing me. I thought about it and realized I was being dumb. What was I trying to prove? If I don't have to endure the pain, then why should I? So I got the epidural. It wasn't fun at all. It only worked down one side of my body. So as the contractions got worse, I could feel them on the left side of my body. It was a crazy feeling. After what seemed like forever, they finally believed me and came and gave me another epidural and tilted me to one side to let it flow down the other side of my body. Luckily, it worked! When I was finally able to start pushing, I pushed one time and they could already see his head. So I just kept pushing. I thought things were going great. Except for the fact that I was throwing up between every contraction and I got sooo sleepy. I don't know if it was cuz it was in the middle of the night, cuz I was pushing for so long, or from the epidural or what, but I literally would fall asleep. They would wake me up and tell me to push, then I'd throw up in the bucket Had was holding for me, push, and go back to sleep until the next contraction. I was delirious, and couldn't feel a thing. My whole body was numb and I didn't really know what was going on. Come to find out, I had been hard pushing for 3 hours and he hadn't moved one bit since that first push. And my doctor was no longer on call, so I had a new doctor that worked with him, Dr Meredith (which ended up being a blessing. I loved him!) Well he came in and used a vacuum to try and pull him out and still, this little boy wouldn't budge. Then he said, this is it. I'm giving you one more hard push and if he doesn't come, we've got to do a c-section. I guess it freaked me out enough to push a little bit harder (at least I thought I was pushing harder), and with that last hard push and the help of the vacuum, I had him at 2:57 a.m. He weighed 8.1 lbs and was 20 inches long.
He was so tiny and perfect. They put him on my chest and I was so scared. I couldn't hold him. My arms were like jello and I thought he was going to fall off of me. I was so wiped out! When I had gained enough strength to hold him again, and pay attention to what was going on, I realized he was very alert. He had been laying with Hadley in our room for a couple hours while I slept. He didn't cry, or sleep...just looked around at everything.
Since we had him in the middle of the night, we didn't call or tell anybody until the next morning. Then we had a nonstop stream of visitors from that morning until we left the hospital. I was in too much pain to do anything but lay there, uncomfortably on my side, so I didn't really get pictures of anyone that came, or any good ones of Jeter. But we're so excited to have him finally here and healthy!
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