Greta's Birth

Greta's Birth Story:
We are so happy to have our little Greta Jane here finally!  She is a miracle, and a blessing.  The pregnancy was long, (well it felt that way) and had it's challenges, but I would do it all again in a minute!
I had my cerclage removed on June 7th, and expected history to repeat itself and deliver the baby that day.  At least that was the hope, since we had a move coming up very quickly.  Also my Mother-in-law was going to be in town for a week so we thought it would be great to have her there post baby.  Well, it was complete hubris on my part to think we could actually plan like that.  I thought that all it would take was one long walk and the baby would just pop out.  As it turns out, it was many long walks.  I did 2 to 3 miles a day, almost every day in an effort to get me into labor.  I will even admit to using castor oil.  After a full week of walking, packing and crying, I woke up a week later on Thursday morning June 14th, put on my walking shoes, grabbed my ipod and said as I headed out the door, "this is the walk that will put me into labor.  Why? Because this would be the most inconvenient day to have this baby."  Sure enough, about 1 mile into the walk, I couldn't keep it up and I had to call Mitch to come and pick me up.  The contractions kept coming, but I didn't want to go into the hospital only to be sent home again. (We had had a false alarm just a few days earlier.)  I got home, and got to work packing.  After a few hours of regular contractions, I decided I should probably go into labor and delivery.  At first Mitch was just going to drop me off, then go home and get his mom to the airport.  That's right, my Mother-in-law was leaving that very day at 2:00 PM.  Luckily, our better reason won out and Mitch came with me. When we got there, I was put into a tiny little triage room, and told to wait until there was a doctor available.  Almost as soon as I got hooked up to the monitors, I started feeling the contractions very strong and regular.  In fact I felt like I needed to push.  I finally called for the nurse, who rushed in a doctor, our friend Dr. Jurus, who checked me, pronounced me in real labor and said declared that I be admitted.  At that point I told Mitch to call his friend Dr. Adhikary, the Anesthesiologist to give me my epidural.  I was trying the hypno-birthing method, but there was too much chaos around me to keep it up, and Mitch had already arranged for the pain specialist to do my epidural since I'd had such a hard time with my epidurals in the past.  While all this was going on, we were trying to get Madelyn a ride to the airport, and get someone to watch our kids.  I was actually trying to make the phone calls between contractions, until I realized it just wasn't going to work, I needed to focus to get through each contraction.

In what felt like a matter of minutes, I got my IV placed, my epidural placed, (the doctor brought an ultrasound machine to look at my back and he was fast and wonderful,) we got a ride for Madelyn, (thank you Linsy) and found someone to watch our kids, (thank you Andrea.)  Everything was all settled, and I got to relax, sleep and anxiously await meeting our little girl.

This is the look of happiness, and excitement, also the look of someone who got an epidural!

After a few hours I felt like I needed to push.  I told the nurse who told the doctor. She doctor came in and broke my water and told me it would be awhile after breaking my water because I went from a 10 back to a 7.   However, Greta had other plans, within minutes I knew it was time to push. Again the doctor was called, she check me and said that I was fully dilated, but that she hadn't dropped so I could wait. I said, no, I needed to push. So the doctor said I could try a few practice pushes with my nurse and was headed out the door. Luckily my wonderful nurse told the doctor that I had delivered Lily very quickly and that she should stick around. Dr. Gupta was a little skeptical, but decided to stay. After one push she was almost out, by two she was coming and they had to tell me to stop because they weren't ready, and at three, she was out. She was born at 7:01 PM, weighing in at 7 lbs 3 oz.  She came so fast that I had to be told to look down and see her.  She was here, and so beautiful!  I knew her face as soon as I saw her.  She looked like my other babies.  I love that moment.  The moment when you see your baby for the first time.  There is really no way to ever explain how it feels.
She didn't cry right away, I thought that meant she was a content baby.  They got her to cry and then handed her to me, and she stopped crying.  The doctor and nurses kept working with her to keep her crying.  My thought was that she was just so happy and content to be in my arms, so she didn't need to cry.  I guess I was wrong.  They quickly took her to the baby warmer and begin working with her.  She was making a cute little grunting sound, I thought it was just an adorable baby sound, but again, I was wrong because this was a sign that something was wrong.  Since she came out so fast the fluid in her lungs didn't get pushed out and so she had something called transient tachypnea, or wet lung.  The NICU doctor determined that she needed to go into the transitional nursery for observation for a few hours.  There they would determine if she needed to go into the NICU. 

I did get to hold her for a little while before they took her away.  As I held her Mitch said, "She looks like she could be our Greta."  That got me all teary and I knew she would be our Greta Jane.  Greta means "child of light," and Jane means "God is gracious."   She is truly a source of light in our life and a blessing from the grace of God. 

After almost 5 hours I finally got my baby girl. Everything was fine, the wet lung had resolved, and there was no need for her to go to the NICU.  I tried to take advantage of the time she was in transitional care to get some sleep, but I was just too excited.  My arms ached to hold my baby girl. Once I was able to hold her in my arms I finally got some sleep.
She is a sweet little girl. I have said this every time I have had a baby, but I feel like I knew her the second I saw her. She has been such a blessing to our family. We are so, so grateful that she is ours.

I need to give photography credit to Mitch.  He did an amazing job.  I put the camera on manual, set the aperture and told him to keep the meter in the middle, and he did it.  The pictures turned out beautiful.