D-day: She's Finally Here!!

Our little bundle of joy is finally here. Zoe Adele was born June 29th at 6:29 p.m. She weighed 7lb 1oz and was 19 inches long.

We went in to the hospital on Monday the 28th. My doctor decided that since the baby was a little sideways that we would do a version and then I would be induced. I was 39 weeks at the time. I went in for my appointment, and it appeared that the baby had straightened herself out so the doctor determined that a version was not needed. We headed over to labor and delivery, checked in and started the induction process. I wasn't crazy about the idea of induction, but my doctor did not want the baby to get too large since I wanted to do a vaginal delivery. The induction, however, did not go as planned. By Monday evening at 5 p.m. I had only dilated about an inch so they continued to up my pitocin through the night. My water broke around 11 p.m. and after that point we started to make some progress. I had the epidural done early the next morning. Later that day once the contractions started to get really rowdy, we discovered that the epidural did not take properly and the medicine was not working. I was attached to so many machines and IV's at that point that I was not able to get up an move around. The baby had shifted and I stopped dilating around 7cm. At this point I had been in labor for over 30 hours and I knew something was not right. It was at this point that we decided a c-section needed to be done because the baby was not going to be able to fit through my pelvis.

Fortunately, baby Zoe was okay. Her face was a little puffy on one side from being forced down at an odd angle during labor, but she was otherwise healthy and strong. They had me strapped down during the procedure so I was not able to hold her right away, but they did bring her over for me to meet her while they were stitching me up. I was so elated because she was absolutely perfect and seeing her face made it all worth it.

We made quite a few videos of the whole process with the exception of the delivery. Surprisingly, I was in good spirits in the videos despite how badly the labor was going in the final hours. The first week of recovery ended up being harder for me than the labor and delivery, probably because I labored for so long before have the c-section.

Zoe is now 1 month old. The time has really flown by. We're still trying to adjust to the lack of sleep, and I have been having issues with milk production which I'm a little disappointed about, but I am so thankful that my precious little girl is healthy and happy. I'm just trying to enjoy and capture as many little moments as I can because I know that she won't be an infant for long.