Sara's Here!

Well, it's taken me a week to get this down on "paper," but you'll have to forgive me -- I just had a baby! That's right, my suspicions last week were correct; I was in labor. Zack got home from work around 5:30 and ate his dinner (that I cooked, thank you!), and my family came over then as well. My contractions were getting closer together and pretty uncomfortable, so we decided around 6:30 that I should go ahead and go. We ended up making it to the hospital a little before 7:00 p.m. Dr. Duke (who I would have chosen had I had the chance) was on call, checked me and said I was 4 cm dilated and 90% effaced. He wanted to go ahead and break my water, so about 45 minutes later, he came back (I was now 5cm/100%) and did just that. I had about 2 more contractions that were just uncomfortable, and then things picked up quickly! Zack has an actual time line of when things occurred, but for me, the next three hours passed in a painful blur.

Looking back, it's hard to remember very many specifics because I was trying so hard to relax, but I do know that if Zack and Mom hadn't been there, I couldn't have done it! There were a few times that I thought things like, "I never want to do this again!" and it was definitely the hardest thing I've ever done, but worth it for sure! Around 10:45, the nurse checked me and said I was 10 cm dilated and it was time to push. She had me give 2 good pushes, and then called out the door, "The doctor needs to come now!" The next contraction I actually had to breathe through because the baby was crowning and the doctor wasn't ready. That third push, at 10:53 p.m., Sara arrived! She was a nice shade of blue-gray, and Mom even says she had the umbilical cord wrapped around her neck, but she let out her first cry and within seconds, the doctor was asking Zack if he wanted to cut the cord (which, surprisingly, he did!). He did just fantastic through the whole thing, and was pretty immediately in love :) They took her immediately over to the warmer, where she was howling, until she heard her daddy's voice. He began to talk to her, and she immediately stopped crying.

Annie didn't make it until about 45 minutes after Sara was born, even though she booked it from Amarillo and made it in a record 6.5 hours. We had lots of other visitors too -- my whole family, Laura, Bro Kenny, and Jay & Betty.

We had to stay in the hospital for 2 nights, since she was born so late at night, but now we're home!