We have a daughter, I'm a mom. Its crazy, and I am still getting used to that fact. I'm also still adjusting to what baby cues and signals mean because its all over the place. And this little one is crafty.
Heres a little bit about how Miss Ellery came into the world:
Saturday March 29th at 9pm my water broke. We drove to Seton and checked in and by that time, the contractions got worse leading up to some pretty painful ones by 11pm. But by midnight I had an epidural and settled in for the night. I was given pitocin at 3am because nothing had progressed. We waited a bit. I watched Golden Girls while David and my mom slept. By around 6am, her heartbeat started to drop at each contraction, so we were hoping to get to 10cm fast, and sure enough we got there soon after. I pushed for about 45 minutes and then our little girl was born into this world. She was perfectly healthy and I wasn't too bad myself.
David was amazing, and my mom was amazing. Having them both in the delivery room was very important to me and I wouldn't have had it any other way.
We've been adjusting here at the house and figuring out how to manage it all. I couldn't do it without my mom and my mother in law. Both are here to help me whenever I need it. Which is such a gift.
One other thing I will mention. Breastfeeding is and will be the hardest thing I have ever approached in my life. For me, it didn't work. I wanted it to SO badly. So afterward, I turned to exclusively pumping. And then pumping and feeding was like having twins and everyone around me that cared and loved me advised me to stop pumping and save my sanity. So I did, 3 weeks in. It was gut wrenching and emotional. I wanted so badly to keep giving my baby this wonderful gift my body could give her. But the more important thing to me was to give my child a happy mommie. And because I knew if I weaned myself, Id try to keep it up... I stopped pumping cold turkey, which might have been the 2nd most painful thing to giving birth.
On to more happy things, here are some interesting facts about our lives with a baby.
- the bumpier the road for the car ride the better, stop lights are not our friend
- my hair will 90% of the time be up, I haven't "fixed" my hair in over a week.
- I have mastered the art of "shushing"
- the 5 S's are genius, and swaddling is the best thing since sliced bread
- we should have started using the exercise ball sooner for rocking/bouncing to sleep
- my hands have never been more dry and cracked from washing my hands at every turn of my day
- I have contorted my body in every which way to reach my crying baby and put the pacifier back in her mouth in the car, as well as feed and change her in the car, its our own mini home
- my mom or I has made over 50 trips to buy buy baby in her 6 weeks of life
- I will never get a full uninterrupted 8 hours of sleep again, or at least it feels like it
- our lives are so immensely full of love!
thanks for everyone's support and love, we appreciate it so much!
{ 6 weeks old }
