We have now been living with little Luke for 3 1/2 weeks. It's been a great transition - the girls are totally in love with their baby brother and things are really going well with us learning to be a family of five. Of course there are struggles, but that's to be expected right?! :)
I wanted to write about Luke's birth story right away, but have been a bit occupied with getting accustomed to living life with a newborn again! I'll start at the beginning...
It took 10 months for me to get pregnant this go 'round, so I was very ready for Luke to arrive way before he was due. And he tricked me several times, giving me hours of contractions that ended in false labor. So when my contractions started again around 5:30 Tuesday evening (Nov. 9th) I assumed they'd stop in a few hours like all the times before. By about 10:30 pm I was pretty sure this was the real deal and called my mom first (to give her a heads up) and then my doctor. My doctor told me to go to the hospital and if it truly was real labor, then I'd be admitted and they'd let her know.
I was still pretty calm at this point and felt very in control of the contractions and the situation. I called my friend and neighbor to come stay with the girls until my dad arrived to relieve her. About 11:15 pm Adam and I headed to the hospital while my mom and dad were driving in from Ft. Wayne and my brother from Purdue!
Once I was in triage, they checked me and I was 5 centimeters dialated! This was great news since I was still waiting for them to tell me it was false labor and to go home. :) I was so happy and ready to meet this little guy that the midwife said "Are you having an epidural? Because you seem pretty happy for being 5 centimeters along!"
We got to the labor and delivery room around midnight. My mom arrived around 1:30 am and I was still feeling pretty in control, much more than with either of the girls' labors. I had each of them naturally, as I was planning on doing with Lucas as well, but they were both posterior, meaning they were face up, rather than the normal face down. This causes a ton of back pain during labor. I'm sure this is the reason I felt more comfortable during my labor to this point.
About 3:30 am, my water still had not broken and my contractions were getting much stronger and closer together. The nurse called my doctor and she said to check my progress again and if I was far enough along she'd come in and break my water. I was 8 centimeters dialated, so around 4:00 am my water was broken.
My water broke naturally with both of the girls, so I didn't know what to expect. The actual breaking of the bag wasn't painful, but the amount of pressure that I immediately started to feel was nuts. I think that with the girls I wasn't as dialated when my water broke, so my body had more time to transition. Well, not with Luke. I felt like I was ready to push almost instantly, but I wasn't dialated enough and my darn doctor wouldn't let me push. :) This was one of the hardest parts of my labor - not pushing...
Around 4:30 my doctor finally gave me the go ahead to push. (My mom made a quick call to my dad to get the girls up and bring them to the hospital at this time.) Up to this point my contractions were so close together that I was getting so little rest between them that I was completely worn out. Plus, I was so tired from being up for almost 24 hours that I felt too physically tired to do so. This is the point where I see God stepping in to help me. After my first round of pushing, I started having longer breaks between contractions. At one point I joked that I thought my labor was stopping because of the time between my contractions! It probably was only a minute or so, but it felt like forever, which provided me with some great rest time between contractions and pushing.
At 4:52 am, little Lucas was born. I thought he was going to be my biggest baby (he sure felt big when he was inside!) by he weighed in at 7 lbs. 3 oz. and 20 in. long which was 3 oz. and 1/2 in. less than Cami (but a whole 1 lb. 2 oz. and 1/2 in. more than Alaina!!).
The girls rushed in (still in PJ's) to be the first ones to meet him. Alaina instantly was in love. Cami just acted like it was any other day. :)
Unfortunately, because of my gestational diabetes and required insulin, they had to take him to NICU very shortly after he was born to monitor his blood sugars. This was really hard - I only got to hold him for about 2 minutes before they took him and Adam didn't even get to hold him. They did allow Adam to go with Lucas to NICU 30 minutes later, so that was nice at least for Adam to be able to sit with him there. We also were able to spend some time with him there when I was being taken to my post-partum room, but that wasn't until about 7:15 am.
Luke was in NICU until 9:45 am and then he was cleared to leave NICU and to stay with us. Thankfully his blood sugars were stable and they didn't need to do anything to him during his stay in NICU. Mine were also stable right away without insulin, so I'm quite thankful for that.
It seems so long ago already. Luke is already changing - being purposefully alert and making sounds. He knows our voices and intently studies our faces. The girls are so great with him - they hold him and care for him when he cries. Cami likes to sing a song she made up for him called "You're fussy" which he actually really likes. :) Alaina is wonderful at holding Luke and really wants responsibiliy with him more and more. It's nice to see her so in love with him, since it was really hard for her when Cami was born.
I can't wait for all of you to meet him. Here's a glimpse of what I see when I look down at my little man...
Isn't he perfect?
