Our precious little girl was born July 29, 2012 at 5:49 pm.
About three weeks before Noelle was due I went to my ob appointment and found out I was measuring about 40 weeks, when I should have been measuring 37! The doctor ordered a growth check sonogram so we could see how Noelle was growing. The next week I had the sonogram. Before the sonogram tech told me how big they thought she was, she said, "Now this is just an estimate, just an estimate. It could be give or take a pound. Its just an estimate." Her reassuring me that what she was about to tell me was "just an estimate" made me think oh goodness, this is going to be scary! They estimated she was 9 lbs and 5 oz! With over 2 weeks left until my due date! Carrying her around, I knew she felt big, and this confirmed my achey body! This girly was going to be a big baby. I hadn't had any problems with this pregnancy. My blood pressure had been great, and no crazy swelling. Since everything was so great, my doctor could not induce until I was 39 weeks. That was 10 whole days for my already 9 pound baby to get even bigger. I was a little worried. We set the date to induce on the 29th and hoped I would go into labor on my own before then, but I didn't. The 29th came and we were more than ready to meet our little girl! We arrived at the hospital around 6:15am and got checked into our labor room. We were so excited and in a very goofy mood. Maybe because of the lack of sleep from the night before. Of course, I stayed up as late as I could cleaning and making sure everything was ready. I wouldn't have been able to sleep anyways, I had that kid on christmas eve feeling. The nurse asked me all the routine questions and I had to fight the urge to give her sarcastic and silly answers. We finally got things started and my labor progressed slowly throughout the day. Myles and I just chilled in the room and watched the olympics and waited. Sometime late morning/ early afternoon, the doctor finally made it by to break my water, and I got my epidural soon after. The epidural did not go as good as it did when I had Eli. It took the CRNA a while to get it in and it was more painful too. I also think it was more difficult this time because my contractions were stronger while I was getting it than they were with Eli. After it was in, it took some adjusting to get the medicine working evenly on my contractions. The labor continued to progress slowly. Around 4:50 I was finally at a 5 and that is when things started really moving. Everything moved really fast. Around 5:30 I was at a 7 and then about 10 minutes later Noelle was coming. The doctor literally got there just in time to catch her, which kind of had me on edge. Noelle's birth was much more painful than Eli's, I felt every ounce of her! I don't think the epidural was working all the way. I didn't have to push long, and I am pretty sure they were having to hold her in while the doctor was gloving up, lol. Noelle was ready to meet us! After all the pain and yelling...and probably scaring all the other patients on the floor, Noelle was born. She was prefect. She had a beautiful, full head of hair and was a healthy baby.
She weighed 9 lbs, 12 oz and was 22 in long. Big girl!
We enjoyed her alone for about 30 minutes, and then let our family in to meet her before they took her to the nursery. It was such a great time.
A couple of hours after my delivery, I began to have a really stiff neck and a bad headache. It turned out that I had a post dural puncture headache (PDPH). This is a possible side-effect from an epidural. What happens is there is a puncture in the dura space in your spine and it leaks cerebral spinal fluid. Leaking CSF makes the pressure in you head get off and causes your brain to sag some, making you feel like your head is going to explode. When you lie down, you feel better because you are horizontal and the pressure isn't effected. There are two ways to treat a PDPH. The conservative way is caffeine, hydration, and staying horizontal as much as possible. If left alone, the leak will heal on its own, it just takes time. I was told about 2-3 weeks. The other treatment is blood patch where a doctor uses your blood to go back in where the leak is and inject your blood to clot over the leak. The risks of the blood patch are the same as the epidural. I didn't like the thought of going through another epidural and possibly be hurting more. Even though the blood patch is supposed to be very effective, I was just done with needles for the time being so I choose the conservative route. I would not suggest doing this! And if I had the choice again I would probably choose to have the blood patch. My horrible headaches lasted for about 4 weeks, and although they did get better as the time went by, it was awfully painful! I went to the ER the friday after giving birth and tired to get a blood patch, but I found out they don't have an anesthetist working on the weekends. I was then supposed to get to set up to have one on the following monday, but that fell through as well because they told me I had to be off Motrin, which the Dr. had prescribed for pain, for 5 days! However, when they were going to give me the blood patch in the hospital I was taking the pain medicine. So I just had to keep waiting for it to heal on its own. I still get a headache every once in a while from it, and there are certain things I do, like getting up fast in the morning and being on the computer that give me a headache easier, but it is still getting better.
Besides all the headache and neck pain, life with Noelle has been great. She is so sweet and quite the little snuggler. And let me tell ya, the during the olympics is a great time to have a baby and be on bed rest, lol. We enjoyed snuggling with our newborn while watching the games. It was nice when we were up in the wee hours of night feeding, that there was something good on to help keep us awake. Eli did great with her too. He did miss us when he stayed with grandparents, but he still had a good time and was a joy to everyone he was with. He loves Noelle and is so sweet with her. He loves to give her kisses, check on her when she is crying, and knows how to help with throwing her dirty diapers in the trash. We are loving life as a family of four and feel we are greatly blessed. I have never been so thankful for health. After living with PDPH for a month, I can not imagine living with chronic pain or sickness. Praise the Lord for a healthy family, and praise the Lord he is healing me!
We love you baby girl, and are so thankful you are here!
