Baby Anna

Aaaah...no more feet in my ribs, no more heartburn, no more shortness of breath....I'm not pregnant anymore!!! Now there are a few other kinds of pain that I'm dealing with, but now I have a cute little baby to show for it! I thought I'd write this post about the day of the delivery - since it was a scheduled C-section, it was probably a little different than what most people experience when they go to the hospital to have a baby.

January 10, 2008
4:20 a.m. - wake up, shower, do hair and makeup, make myself pretty
5:10 a.m. - depart for hospital
5:30 a.m. - check in through emergency department - walk to labor and delivery floor and check into room
5:45 a.m. - 7:00 a.m. - monitor fetal heartbeat, get IV hooked up, answer questions, sign papers, try to rest, get shaved, let the anxiety build 'til I feel I'm about to burst, pray, etc. Eric sits and watches TV, hacks onto the hospital internet, keeps a calm, peaceful feeling in the room.
7:10 a.m. - anesthesiologist visits and discusses drug treatment, gives Mom permission to come into the OR along with Eric
7:20 a.m. - walk to OR where it is FREEZING cold while Eric and Mom put on their scrubs, get spinal anesthesia which didn't hurt nearly as badly as I thought it would, lose all feeling from the waist down, watch nurses prepare and count the surgical instruments, find out that my nurse's name is Anna (I thought that was a good omen)
7:30 a.m. - Dr. Illingworth and Dr. Harris are in place and cutting begins before Eric and Mom are even in the room! But don't worry - they didn't miss it...
7:42 a.m. - Anna comes into the world crying...my doctor was laughing because she was crying before her body was even out of me. All that was out was her head and she was already makin' noise! All I felt was some pressure where they pushed down on my stomach to help push her out. Dr. Harris brings her around the drape for me to see - something I didn't get to see last time - I passed out the moment I heard Haylie cry!

They took Anna over to get her cleaned up and Eric and Mom followed while they sewed me up. But Mom couldn't stay away - she really enjoyed watching them sew me up. She enjoys watching the shows on TV where they do surgeries. Not a woman with a weak stomach!! She was also fascinated to watch the nurses count all the instruments again and count the dirty rags, etc. to make sure nothing got left behind! Dr. Illingworth asked me how many more kids I want and said that my uterus looks good enough to hold a couple more babies and he said he threw in a few extra stitches to make sure it was extra strong. Kinda cool to know that he's seen inside there and can say for sure that it is safe to do it a couple more times.

~8:00 a.m. - I'm all sewn up and taken to recovery where I felt the feeling SLOWLY creep back into my legs. What a weird sensation. The nurse would check about every 15 minutes and ask me to wiggle my toes or bend my knees...when I could finally get my knees to bend, they took me to my room. Another nice thing about this time was that Mom and Eric got to be in the recovery room with me - when I had Haylie I was all alone (but so doped up I didn't really notice). So anyway, the time went by quickly and I was in my room by about 9:30 a.m. (I think). When we got to my room, I had to lift myself from one bed to the other - with the help of 2 nurses, of course. My legs were still pretty numb so I could move them, but I still couldn't feel them - so my brain told my legs to move, and they moved, but I couldn't actually FEEL them move...it was sooo weird watching my body move and knowing that I told it to move, but not actually FEELING it.

~10:45 a.m. - They finally bring Anna to me after I asked the nurse what was taking so long - "I WANT MY BABY!!" She didn't have any problems breathing or anything so I think the nurses were playing with her and didn't want to give her to me. :-)

C-section patients are given the priority for their own rooms, but when there are lots of babies being born, you get what you get. I was not fortunate enough to get my own room this time, but I was fortunate enough to get a semi-private room - a room that holds 3 patients, but the part of the room I was in was as big as the part that held the other 2 patients and there was a wall in between us, AND I got my own bathroom - so I could hear what was going on over there, but still felt a great deal of privacy. Eric could not stay the night this time, and I was disappointed by that, but it ended up being kinda nice - I got to send Anna to the nursery during the night and they would bring her to me when she needed to eat, then take her back when she was finished. The only down side to that was that I STILL didn't get any sleep due to my roommate's obnoxious snoring. AAAARGH!! So, I was prepared the second night. Earplugs. That did the trick. I slept wonderfully that night!

I can't believe what a different experience this has been. The recovery process has been 100 times better than last time. They let me go home a day earlier than last time because I was doing so well getting around. Anna is just as sweet as can be. She is so much like Haylie, I can hardly believe it. Not only does she look like Haylie but she behaves exactly as Haylie did too. She RARELY cries. When she is hungry, she "chirps" as Eric calls it, she wakes in the middle of the night to eat, then goes right back to sleep. I know that it may not last long, but I sure am enjoying it for now.

Haylie is adjusting well to being a big sister. She loves to look at Baby Anna in her bed and has even named her baby doll "Anna". She likes to throw away dirty diapers for us and she loves giving Anna kisses on her head. She has gotten a little more feisty over the last few days but hasn't shown any indication that she is jealous of Anna or resentful of her at all. I had to show her the "ouchy" on my tummy so that she would know to be careful with me and she has been very sensitive of that. She suddenly seems so big. I'm so grateful that my mom has been here with me to help out. And, Eric's mom is coming on Saturday after my mom leaves so I'll have even more help. I'm also grateful for Eric who gets up in the middle of the night with me since I still have a difficult time moving around. He's an expert midnight diaper-changer!

I feel so blessed.

Go to http://picasaweb.google.com/kmetler/AnnaJennellMetler to see pictures.