All About Kevin

Due to popular request, here are more photos of the center of our universe. He went in for his first doctor's visit today and she said he is doing great. He's gained weight already, passing his birth weight.

For those interested in the delivery story: I'd been having contractions on and off all through Thursday night into Friday morning. At my OB appointment right before lunch, my doctor stripped my membranes again. That increased my contractions and by 2pm they were coming every 3 minutes when I walked around. Daniel, having worked the night before, was exhausted. I about killed him for falling asleep while I was in intense pain, but he really couldn't help it. By 5pm I knew this was IT. So we dropped the kids off at the Millers house and got to the hospital around 6pm.

Stephanie, a friend of mine from Sunday school, came up to help me through labor and delivery. The whole process was much easier this time around. They let me skip the IV and just have a hep lock in my hand. I also was allowed to walk around for 30 minutes and then just have the fetal monitor on for about 20 minutes, then walk some more. What really surprised me was that I was able to breathe through the pain all the way up to the end. I was dilating so quickly that my doctor went ahead and gowned up because she knew he was coming fast. I think I only pushed for 30 minutes at most and Kevin practically jumped out at the end. The whole thing was over before 10 pm. Then I couldn't stop smiling and babbling adoringly to Kevin even though I was still in pain while the doctor numbed and stitched me.

The truly hard part was when they took my baby boy away to the nursery and wouldn't bring him back! I fed him at birth, and then they didn't let me nurse again until fourteen hours later! I absolutely refused to let them stick a tube down his throat to feed him formula. They were afraid he would inhale my milk if I nursed. It was hard seeing him in the NICU, especially since I didn't feel like he had any reason to be there. They finally let us go home on Sunday evening after a slew of tests and two days of observation to determine that he occassionally breathes rapidly and they have no idea why. We just had to promise to bring him to our family doctor first thing on Tuesday. We did that today, and of course he is fine. That's the whole story!