Stats: 6 lbs, 10 oz 19 inches long
Apgar score: 8 and 9
Sadie was born on thursday September 30, 2010. Vail and I checked into Kaiser hospital at 7:00 am. After being admitted to L&D, we both changed into our hospital attire and were prepped for surgery. I was hooked up to 2 monitors - 1 to monitor the fetal heartbeat and 1 to monitor for uterine contractions, given an IV antibiotic, and pumped with several bags of fluids. While I was feeling excited, but a little anxious.....Vail seemed to be very cool and calm, and his main concern was getting his coffee and muffin from the coffee cart and doing his crossword puzzle (the nurse said maybe that was his way of dealing with the anxiety) :) After several hours of waiting, at 9:30 am, it was finally time for surgery...
The operating room was freezing cold! The doctor administered the spinal block, which was amazing. Within seconds of being administered into my spine, a warm sensation went down my legs and I was instantly numb from the chest down. Being anesthesized was a very scary experience - the feeling of being helpless and completely immobile...."deadweight." The medication partially paralyzes the diaphragm, so I had to consiously make an effort to take my breaths in and out, which was also scary. I also experienced major chills - probably from a combination of the freezing cold temperature, the anxiety, and the medication. The surgery took a total of about 30 minutes. I didn't feel a thing physically, but emotionally the feelings are hard to express in words. Excitement for the baby to come, disbelief that this is actually happening, and mostly FEAR - fear that something could go wrong.
Thankfully, everything went as planned. Vail watched the doctor deliver Sadie from the womb. The minute she came out, I couldn't help but to cry. The doctor said "It's a girl...and she looks just like daddy".....which made me want to cry even more, LOL. It was just an overwhelming feeling of relief and joy.
After surgery, we were transported to the recovery room. In the recovery room, they had me nurse baby Sadie. She latched on immediately and had no problems with the feeding. The staff would not let us go to our hospital room until I could wiggle my toes, which wasn't till about 12:30pm. We were greeted in the hallway to our room by Grammie, Gramps, Grandpa, Aunty Diane, and Aunty Kara. It was so exciting!
Over the next 2 days, Sadie had lots and lots of visitors. Uncle Corey, Aunty Jenn, Paisley, and Chase, Great-grandpa and great-grandma Minn, Aunty Shanti, Uncle Ed and Aunty Pat, Uncle Alvin and Aunty Marianne, Aunty Shari and Uncle Jon, Aunty Darlene and Uncle Clint, Aunty Kelsy and Kris and Aunty Brenda, Aunty Cheryl and Uncle Geoff, Aunty Didi, Aunty Gina, Aunty Donalyn and Uncle Dean, and Uncle Taylor. We also recieved flowers and balloons from Uncle Alika and Aunty Misty, Aunty Aggie, The Sesokos, The Akamus, the WPO gang, Aunty Diane, and the Minns.
On Saturday, October 2nd at about 10:30 am we went home! I would say that the overall experience was awesome, except for the non-stop itching that tormented me for 2 days, and the fact that I couldn't eat any solids for about a day and a half, until I "passed gas" - which is the first sign that my digestive tract is functioning properly after being shut down by the medications. On the way home from the hospital, we stopped at the manoa house to visit grandma minn.
The first week home went by in a flash and without any problems. Sadie basically just eats and sleeps, and stays up for a few minutes here and there. It was smooth sailing, until baby was 1 week old. It was at this time that I starting having excruciating breast pain after each feeding. After several days of suffering, I finally figured out that we had thrush (candida fungal infection). We were prescribed nystatin cream for me, and nystatin suspension for baby. After a few days, with no improvement, the lactation specialist recommended we give Sadie gentian violet instead. Not sure if anyone has ever used that stuff before, but it's very messy and stains everything it touches. After putting it in her mouth, her entire mouth including her tongue and lips becomes a okinawan sweet potato purple! Currently, we are still trying to get rid of this pesky infection. We'll try to persist with the breast feeding, but to say the least....it's much harder and a lot more painful than I thought it would be.
More pics...
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| Cousins! |
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