All the nitty-gritty details...

At 1:50 am on Wednesday, September 12th, I awoke suddenly to a gush of water between my legs.  So much water!  There was no question, it was go time.  "Oh my gosh.  This is happening," I laughed.  We packed everything up and headed straight to the hospital.  Since I hadn't started feeling any contractions yet, it was all pretty surreal.  We were going to have a baby today!  We arrived at the hospital around 2:15 and they set me up on some antibiotics.  I was dilated to a 3 and fully effaced.  Two hours later they started the pitocin and we waited for the contractions to come.  I talked to my sister in Germany for a bit and then my mom.  Around 7:30 the nurse came in, looked at the monitor and said, "Well it looks like your contractions are about two minutes apart.  You can have your epidural any time now."  "Well," I said, "I haven't felt any pain yet..."  Around 8, I started feeling the contractions and they escalated quickly.  I got my epidural at 9:20 and was surprised and pleased to discover that it was no more painful than any shot I had ever gotten.  I had probably been the most nervous about that moment but it wasn't bad at all.  So with the scary part out of the way, we waited.  That epidural is brilliant.  I am perfectly ok with never knowing what childbirth is like without it.  It was pretty strange to not feel my legs at all though.  Chris would periodically turn me over and adjust my five pillows around me.  At 10 AM, I was 4 cm and things continued to progress slowly.  We watched a car chase on the news, Coming to America, and most of Tangled.  Finally at 4 PM, the nurse checked me and said that I was fully dilated, but they wanted to wait another hour to let her descend a little on her own.  I faithfully watched the clock anxiously awaiting that 5 o'clock hour... mostly because I was SO hungry.  Food was all I could think about at this point.  We had to get this baby out so I could eat something!  At 5:15, I called the nurse and reported that I was feeling slight pain and pressure in my nether regions, so we started the pushing soon thereafter.  I had the nurse set up the mirror so I could see the progress.  I didn't expect that I would want to see anything, but I actually found it fascinating and motivating to push harder.  Chris was a great coach, holding my leg and rewarding me with ice chips when I did a good job pushing.  

I can't feel my legs!

Just eating my ice chips.

At 6:41 PM, Jane Amy Silva's body slid out and they placed her on my belly and cleaned her up.  It's hard to put into words what that really feels like.  I was mostly just in awe that all this was actually happening.  She was perfect (albeit a little pale from the umbilical cord wrapped around her neck).  Chris cut the cord and did an amazing job taking all of these photos.  Jane was pretty mellow through most of her tests and measurements.  They would have like her to cry a little harder to get those lungs going, but she was pretty calm.  She only gave a little whimper when they gave her her shots.  When they were done cleaning with all their poking and prodding, they gave her back to me and I held our baby girl while Chris fed me sandwich.  It was a long exhausting day even with the epidural, but one of the greatest moments of my life.  We're so thrilled about this little one and can't really stop staring at her.  Everything went so smoothly and we couldn't be more grateful.

Our new family!