He's Here!

Well, he's here! Our little baby has arrived. I think most people who read this have heard the stats and all that, but if you haven't, let me know and I can give you all that information. The birth didn't go quite as planned, which I know that during labor and birth, a lot of things don't go quite as anyone planned, but one major thing changed in my plan: I gave birth in the hospital.

Originally, I was planning a home birth and was thrilled about my decision. No travel involved, familiar with my environment, and no strangers coming in and out. So when you spend 9 months planning and gearing up for a home birth, it's a little shocking to discover that it's not the way that you are going to give birth. The past few weeks, I've had high blood pressure. I was working on trying to get it down and succeeded for like a week. This past Wednesday, however, there was an added surprise in my prenatal appointment: I had protein in my urine. Combined with the high blood pressure, it's a sign of pre-eclampsia. So because of that, I had to go to the hospital to be induced.

I wasn't very happy with the need to go to the hospital, but I knew that it was necessary. Hospitals are there for just such occasions. I won't go into the details of the birth, I wouldn't be able to give a very good hour by hour account anyways since my sense of time was obscured by the fact that I was in labor and it being late at night. The whole labor took about 9 hours though. Besides having to be induced, I was able to have a natural labor, which was the most important thing to me besides having a healthy baby.

Although I don't like hospitals in the slightest, and I would have preferred to have given birth at home, I'm happy with how it worked out. Yes, I would have been even happier without having to fight the nurses about what procedures would or would not be done, and it would have been nice to be able to go home when I wanted to. I have to say though that it was kind of fun to hear the OB resident beg me to stay for the 24 hours that they wanted me to. On the whole though, I can't complain. I have a beautiful baby who is healthy and happy. What more could I want?