Charlotte Rose Leymon entered the world on May 30th at 8 a.m., weighing 10 pounds, 3 ounces and measuring 21.5" long. She has a full head of spiky dark hair and is enchanting everyone who sees her.
Since pretty early on in the pregnancy, I'd been scheduled for a c-section once I hit 39 weeks. That would have actually been Sunday but because it was a holiday weekend, it was pushed to Wednesday. I tried to go to bed early on Tuesday night because I knew we'd have to be up early. But like I expected, I couldn't sleep. I woke up about 1:30 a.m. and never was able to settle back down. Around 4ish I realized I was actually having some pretty intense contractions as well.
We got settled into triage right at 5:30 and they began to prep me for delivery. I was asked if I wanted pain medication, and I quickly said "yes". However, we were too close to the surgery so I had to just breathe through them.
Then two fantastic women walked in who made the rest of the time much more manageable. I didn't know that the hospital had a doula program because we never did any kind of orientation (because we weren't really going to spend much time in the labor & delivery area). A doula, for those of you who don't know, is a labor coach. They were amazing. Brian said that within minutes he could see me process the contractions much better because they were helping me with breathing, massaging pressure points and even holding some lavender near my nose for me to breathe in.
One funny note about the doulas. I guess because it was so early they hadn't updated the dry erase board outside with patient info on it, so one of them said "do you prefer to be called Juanita?" That definitely lightened the mood a little.
Before I knew it, I saw my doctor come in and she was a little surprised to see so much activity as far as the contractions. Just seeing her walk in made me feel so much better and ready to get the show on the road. Then it was time for Brian to get suited up for the OR, and we were off and going.
I was wheeled to the OR and prepped for the procedure. They put a drape up so you can't see what's going on and Brian was able to sit right up by my face and talk to me during the whole thing. I had a spinal tap, which was better than an epidural because it didn't fill me with so much fluid. At one point the drape started to fall and Brian was like "the drape's falling! the drape's falling! I don't really want to see what's going on." They quickly got it placed again, and after about 30 minutes we heard a squeaky little cry that let us know our girl was here.
Right before they got her out, I heard people commenting on her size. Then when they got her out, I heard some people saying "10 pounds easily." Turns out my little girl is quite a big girl, and the cord was wrapped several times around her neck. So even if we'd decided to try for a regular delivery, I would have ended up with a c-section due to both her size and the cord position.
We were in our room by about 10:30, and the rest of the day was spent bonding and attempting to rest. Madeline spent about an hour here, and all I can really say is that it's just going to take some time for her to be comfortable with her new little sister.
Brian decided to take Madeline home last night so she could sleep in her own bed, so I decided to send Charlotte to the nursery so I could attempt to get some real sleep. By the time I settled down I'd been up and going for almost 20 hours and feel much better this morning, so I know it was the right decision.
So here we are today, resting and relaxing. She ate well over the night and now she's just cuddled in her little bed next to me. If all goes as expected, we'll probably be sent home tomorrow afternoon.
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