Henry is born!!

As a few friends have astutely pointed out, Henry isn't even born yet on your blog! In order to catch up the virtual time with real time, I will start of where we left off. I looks like Jon was working on a post that was titled, "Labor is not for the faint of heart", but appears to never have quite finished it. As much as we wanted to keep our blog audience up to date in real time, the excitement and craziness of the birth got the better of us, as I'm sure you can understand.

So, the last post was written by me, post-epidural. I made it to 7cm (10cm is when you get to start pushing the baby out) on my own and my amazing support team kept trying to help me avoid taking any pain medicine, as per my birth plan. We tried all different positions, hydro-therapy in the shower, walking and the jacuzzi tub. Jon loves to tell about how as I was walking to the jacuzzi tub from my room (an arduous 75 yards away), I bent over to grab the wall as I faced a monster contraction and exclaimed, "oh baby!", funny mostly because I hadn't been quite so careful with my language when I was in the privacy of my room. =)

After asking for an epidural for was seemed like several hours (time is hard to judge when you're in pain), I caught my breath between contractions in the jacuzzi and cried to Jon, "I feel like no one is listening when I say I want an epidural. I really really want one." He explained that everyone was trying to help me stick with my birth plan, but if that's what I wanted, he would help me get it.

Once the decision was made, my team moved swiftly to get me some relief via pain medication. They wheeled my back to the room and shortly after Dennis, aka the hero of the moment/anesthesiologist, arrived and administered my epidural. From there the tone changed from the "9th circle of hell", as Jon called it, to excitement and relaxation as we got ready for our bambino to arrive.  We put on Michael Franti and the clouds seemed to part as we gathered steam for the final push.  Here is the picture just after I got the pain medication and a nap. 

Also, here is two thirds of my birth team (the third being Jon, of course).  On the left is our fabulous doula Carrie Cohen.  She worked tirelessly for nearly 24 hours getting me to change positions that helped my labor progress, along with many other tasks along the way.  Her knowledge helped us understand the decisions that we had to make along the way.  Labor and delivery is a wild ride to be sure and she was an excellent coach and advocate throughout the process.  On the right is Jon's mom, Karen, who was gracious enough to join us for a good portion of the labor as well.  Karen, who has given birth to many children and witnessed many more births, gave me and the labor team a positive attitude, and she was always willing to lend a helping hand and a kind word to help us get through.  I cant thank them enough for their loving companionship and tolerance as I went through the trying but wonderful experience that is labor.

As we got ready to begin pushing, Jon decided to ask the doctor if he could help deliver the baby.  Dr. Eilers, who sized up Jon, and said "How involved do you really want to be?"   Jon decided to tell you the story in his own words:

This is Jon writing now.  So, I asked the Doctor if I could catch the baby.  He said that he had taught many a medical student but he had never had a father do it.  I said I was happy to do as much as he'd allow me to, and that was safe for the baby and the mama.  He asked me again, how much do you actually want to get your hands dirty, and if I wanted to get scrubs on and gown up, and everything? and I responded, sure!  Two seconds later, I had a surgical gown and surgical gaitors, and the doc was sizing my hands for surgical gloves.  Here is a pick of the doc tying my gown for me.

As I prepared to catch the baby, the doctor showed me how to guide the baby's head out and explained the shoulders would come out one at a time.  Here is a basic diagram of the process of the baby turning mid-birth canal:

As the baby comes out the crown if the Henry's head exposed a little brown-blond hair and as he came out I wriggled out his shoulders and grabbed his head and bum while he faced away from me.  He was a bit wet with amniotic fluid and I was kind of scared I was going to drop him.  But the doctors hands were outside my hands waiting if i did mess up so we had a safety net in place (after all, I had been awake for 36 hours at that point minus a couple catnaps).   I placed him safely on Margot's chest straight away with the umbilical cord still attached of course.   Ok, back to Margot.

So, Jon's job according to our birth plan was to announce the gender. But because he was so focused on not dropping the baby and the baby was facing away from him, he was unable to see the baby's gender.  I could see his gender clearly when Jon held him up to put him on my chest, but I realized Jon didn't yet know, I announced through the tears, Its a little boy!" 

moments after Henry was born, he spent the first hour resting on my chest, it was amazing.

our new family all together

proud papa

celebrating Henry's arrival

The nurse allowed us ample bonding time and some breastfeeding before putting him on the scale, and to our surprise, he weighed 9lbs, 9oz. and measured in at 22.5 inches.  After months of waiting to know our little one, we finally got to meet him!  And he is wonderful!  More to come later!

PS One final note from Jon:  Ok, so I had put on the Bob Marley Import Album "Freedom Time" right before Margot started pushing. 

I was kind of dancing around the room, helping when I could, but the excitement in the room was palpable.  In fact, the doctor even knew some of the lyrics as Henry was being born.  The two songs below especially stuck in my head which played as Henry was being born, and we in fact did bend down to catch him (real low) and steady rocked easy once he was born.