Ashley's coming home today

Ashley decided to make an early arrival.  On Thursday night  (04.22) I finished up my water aerobics class at 7p and something felt a little off.  After showering and getting dressed, my water broke (!!) on my way out of the locker room!  I was sort of in denial, like maybe I peed my pants....but as I continued to walk to my car and more kept coming I knew it was time.  Despite being across the street from the hospital, I drove home to take a "real" shower, get my stuff and most importantly tell Pete!  We called the doctor who told us to make our way to the hospital, so we got there about 8:45p.

We got up to the unit by about 9p and I was 3cm dilated.  The nurse said "How much pain would you like to feel during labor?" I said not really any!!!  So I still foolishly tried to wait it out, and then when I asked for my epidural I was having short painful contractions every 2 minutes.  The epidural hurt alot going in, more than I was prepared for but once it was all set the Epidural was amazing...not quite sure why someone would pass up that opportunity!  At that point I was 5 cm so they opted not to start pitocin and I slept from about 11:30p - 3:30a.  At 3:30 the nurse came in to check on things because the heart rate was dipping a little with each contraction, although not dramatically so.  By then I was 8 cm, so decided it was time to wake up and start paying attention!  By 4a-430 I was 10 cm, so they called the Dr who was making her way to the hospital.  It was Dr Goldin who was a very sweet doctor, and we were relieved because there were 2 doctors we really didnt like.  When she got there we did some "practice pushes" and basically realized I couldnt feel contractions....i thought this was a great thing, but the monitor wasnt picking up my contractions so they said we had to turn down the epidural and start some pitocin (which causes contractions).  So there was a few more practice pushes, but mostly fussing around and waiting, then the real pushing began at about 6a.  That lasted til 7:21a when Ashley was born!!  So epidural helped alot still but definitly hard work....and whoever thinks there is a difference between pressure and pain is kidding themselves!

So since then things have been pretty mellow - Ashley seems like a pretty good baby so far (knock on wood!).  We had Dee and Sara visit, and of course Caitlin, but other than that just me and Pete - which is nice because I get pretty tired.  So we are heading home today, just waiting for the pediatrician to come around and discharge Ashley.

We are probably going to do most of our photo sharing so if your not already our friend, find us! But if you dont have facebook, here is the link to the album for now

And so much for the big baby they were telling us we were having, even though she was 3 weeks early, she still couldnt have got that big - she is 6 lbs 4 oz

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2230367&id=14306913&l=c03b0488b2