After 36 long and arduous hours of labor, Abby decided to make her debut on October 6th at 2:08 pm. We were very lucky to have her come the same weekend as the shower so my mom was able to extend her trip to stay with the kids while I was in the hospital. I realized I was in labor sometime very early Sunday (Conference) morning and spent the day relaxing at home. Greg and I decided to go into the hospital that night about 10:00 because we did not want to risk my water breaking at home and racing to the hospital. When we arrived I was dilated 4 cm and they decided to admit me. I decided to play it safe that night and try to get some sleep (previously I had tried walking the hallways to amp my labor). By morning I was 6 cm and waiting for my doctor's partner to come and break my water. He came about 8:00 am and broke my water. According to previous history I would normally have the baby with in an hour. TWO HOURS LATER, I was still contracting slowly and not progressing (I had actually gone back to a 4). At that point they decided to add some pitocin to see if we could get my contractions to be more consistent and frequent. After ANOTHER TWO HOURS OF PITOCIN, I was in agony. My contractions still were not more frequent although they were the pain of my normal transition labor. I WAS STILL 4 CM. At 1:00 (after 35 hours of labor) I joined my fellow mothers with getting an epidural. I refused and refused with my others to get one but when they said it would still be another 3-4 more hours I couldn't do it any more. I was most concerned with how exhausted I was becoming after two sleepless nights. I got the epidural which was a strange experience in itself. It definately took most of the edge off, I could still feel the contractions on one side. They turned me over to that side to use gravity to numb it and suddenly I was very nauseous and very hot. Greg said that he and the nurse gave each other the uh oh look and realized I was completely dilated. That was 20 minutes from when they put the epidural in. The nurse anestatist was kind enough to dose me with some lidocaine beyond the pain meds in my epidural and I was numb for a good five hours. It was incredibly bizarre to tell my toes to wiggle and they would do it but I couldn't feel them do it. So, anyway, they told me not to push, called the doctor and he arrived 20 minutes later and I pushed three times and she came out. For being 3 weeks early, she was an amazing 7 lb 9.5 oz and 19 inches long. That is almost a full pound bigger than our biggest. Apparently, my babies are getting bigger and my deliveries are getting longer. We jokingly call Abby our Little Diva. She wanted to come when she wanted to and no way were we doing anything about it. I was glad she was early for the sake that she could have been much bigger if she had waited till the 25th. Here are some pictures of her first day and her first visitors. As you can see the boys are ecstatic to have her here. We had to play some juggling with Logan (the youngest) since he had croup the day she was born. Oh the joy of a large family. :)
Uncle Eric was making dinosaur faces at the boys. It made for a great picture.
Check out those cheeks and the double chin! She is beautiful and even has a little bit of fat on her legs. No chicken legs here! Can you see the mowahk of hair on the top of her head?
