42 Weeks... Let the Adventure Begin!

 Week 42 Complete

How far along? He came at 41 and 6 days.

Baby is the size of: A 7 pound 10 ounce 2 week over due little one.

What did the baby develop: The ability to breath air, eat, poop, and cry.

Gender: 1 baby boy! I checked.

How many: 1! Thank goodness!
Showing a bump: The remnants of one.

Maternity clothes: Really anything stretchy.

Stretch marks: Not that I could find.

Sleep: Different then during pregnancy, but still not as bad as I had anticipated though. About every 2-3 hours to feed and I can sleep in between.

Movement: His little arms and legs like to go non stop. Thomas also said his bowel likes to move too.

Best moment this week: The relief of him coming out and every moment after that with him.

Miss anything: The beloved birth story. The full version will be it's own post, but the abbreviated version is below.
Medical Help: Lidocaine, a few stitches, and the rogam shot for me and a heel prick for him.
Emotionally Feeling: In awe that he came out of me, that he is ours, and that this is all real.

Belly button in or out: In. More so then when I first got pregnant.

Food cravings: Nope

Anything making you queasy or sick: No.

Symptoms/Side effects: A squishy heart. Mom hormones. 

Wedding ring off or on: On

Happy or Moody most of the time: Happy

Looking forward to: Everyday spending time time just watching him sleep and also become more aware of the world around him.
Things they don't tell you about pregnancy: That when you have a slow break in your water, you will go through a box of pads just to make sure you don't wet everything you sit on!

Week 42

None of us could have anticipated 13 days late!

Day 1

 We made it home!

 And even got a nap in!

Business in the front and party in the back! 

 Day 2

 Life is so rough!

 Day 3

 Thomas is rocking the dad business!

 He has times of extreme alertness and lots of times of sleepiness.

Again, he has the dad business down!

Day 4

 Just enjoying every day together!

What do I already know about him?
A friend asked me that and I loved it. At 24 hours, this is what I have learned.

He is a pretty good sleeper and nurser. He definitely startles easily. When he is wide awake and happy he will just stare at us, taking it all in. He loves being swaddled and is not happy when his diaper/clothes are being changed. So basically he doesn't like being cold. He nurses best skin to skin. Even though he loves being swaddled, his little hands always come out and are up by his face.

His birth story (abbreviated version): 
If you want to hear the story, but not read the one that will be inundated with details and possibly graphic, read this one.

My water broke Friday night at 6. I was still able to go home and get 10 hours of sleep. I stayed close to home all day Saturday and just labored at home. Mostly I didn't really feel the contractions even though they would go from 10 minutes apart to 2 minutes apart until about 7pm. I could then start to feel them and we planned to meet my midwife at The Birthing Inn in 2 hours to see where I was at. I sent Thomas to bed to hopefully get a little rest. At about 9 we texted again and decided to meet at 10:30. At this point the pain had ramped up and I had hit a wall, so I woke up Thomas to help me cope until we had to leave. When we got there, she checked me and I was only at 4 cm, but my cervix had completely thinned (100% effaced). We could go home and labor more, or stay and see what happened over the next few hours. We decided to stay. She went to sleep in her office and Thomas and I walked, lunged, tried to rest, and ended up in the birthing tub. When I had first arrived, the water tub took the pain of the contractions away. 3 hours later at 1:30 am, now Sunday, when I was in the water and the contractions were still crazy intense and I knew we needed Neva. Thomas went and got her between contractions. After she watched a contraction, she checked me and I was already 8 cm dilated. For the next hour and 20 minutes, I worked through the last 2 cm. The final 40 min was the ring of fire where Adler's little head was half way out almost the entire time. He finally joined us in the tub with and it was the sweetest relief! He went straight to my chest where he was massaged and he started to cry. Thomas was able to cut the cord with the knife that did 2 deployments to Iraq with him! He then got to do skin to skin while i birthed the placenta in the water, then transitioned to the bed for the uterine massage. Adler was given to me to breast feed and to distract me from the fact that I needed to be stitched up from my second degree tear. They weighed (7 lbs 10 oz) and measured (21 in) him, I passed the "walk to the bathroom without passing out" test and then we were discharged to go home at 7 am. We were home 9 hours after we walked in the doors of The Birthing Inn with a little boy in our arms.

Follow up appointment number 1, he weighed 7 lbs 6 oz and was perfect in every other way.
Follow up appointment number 2, he weighed 7 lbs 8 oz. Almost back up to his birth weight!

Thomas:
You guys, he was the best coach and encourager during labor. He even got a half smile out of me at one point. And he is rocking the dad thing. He is amazing at taking care of us! He is completely smitten! He says "He is just so cute!" no less then a dozen times every day since he was born.

You All:
Seriously, all of your encouragement and love is just beautiful! We are so stinking blessed to have all of your support and love! I loved how much you all were just on the edge of your seats at this little boy took the perfect (although the longest) amount of time possible to join us. We love all of you and can't wait for you to meet him!!