It's a Boy!!!

Nicholas Graem was born on March 18, 2013 at 1:09pm, weighing 7 lbs, 2 oz and measuring 19.5 inches long.  He came into the world with subtle cries before deciding to just take in the world around him.

First Family Photo (minus Mikaela)

Labor:
We arrived at the hospital at 9am and were taken back to our labor and delivery room.  My fabulous nurse, Michelle got me a gown and hooked up to the fetal monitor and contraction monitor pretty quickly.  She was waiting for some orders to actually start the pitocin.  While waiting we discovered I was already having pretty regular contractions, they just weren't very intense yet.  My nurse later called my induction more of an augmentation because Nicholas would have been there by Tuesday without the help of medicine.  Dr. Jaffee came in to break my water around 10.  Soon after that, Michelle started my low dose of pitocin.  I was only about a 3.5 at that point.  Contractions came a little harder now and while I could still tolerate it, I knew it was going to get worse and quickly if Mikaela's birth was any indication so I asked for the epidural then.  The anesthesiologist was concerned that it wasn't going to work, but the pain was subsiding so we felt it was going well.  At 11:30 I was only a 5 and discouraged thinking it was going much slower than I anticipated.  Things quickly changed.  I started to feel pain again, short bursts, but intense.  Mike and I were alone so he looked at the contractions read outs.  It looked as though I was feeling the peak of very hard contractions, as opposed to the entire thing.  Shortly after noon, Dr. Jaffee came in to check and I was 8cm.  Not too long after that the pain got bad (so much for the epidural) and pushing was almost inevitable now.  No time for a new epidural.  Now we had to wait for the dr.  Yeah, cuz that's easy to do.  Anyway, they gave me permission to push, slowly.  Another doctor was there until Dr. Jaffee arrived but I think by this point I was almost done.  She took over and while I know there were a zillion other people in the room, I focused on Mike, Dr. Jaffee, and Michelle, trying not to focus on the pain, hoping it was almost over.  I don't know time frame really at this point, but I estimate pushing about 20 minutes, probably about 4 or 5 times.  Out he came and Mike was given the honor of announcing his gender to me.  I heard his sweet cry, when the nurse brought him to me for a glimpse before they took him away to finish getting cleaned up and admitted.

After everything was done, people filed out and we were left with our son (little No Name) at this point for a beautiful "Golden Hour" as the hospital calls it.  Around 2:30, they took us to our room.  The rest of the evening was full of nurses and procedures before we were finally able to rest later that evening.

Meeting Graempa

Meeting Mikaela

first bath

hearing screening (on Tuesday)

going home ( on Wednesday)