Baby Hyrum is here!!

Hyrum John was born on January 4th (his due date) at 5:18 AM. He weighed in at 9 lbs 12 oz and is 21" long. What a big boy! No WONDER I was so uncomfortable towards the end! And I'm only 4'11" - he didn't exactly have much space in there;) We were NOT expecting him to be that big - especially since his sister was 6 lbs 11 oz and I'd only gained 17 lbs as of my 39 week appointment. And now I have 2 due date babies! How crazy is that? Really, what are the odds? Less than 5% of babies are born on their due dates...and now I've given birth to 2 due date babies.

(Warning: may be TMI for some; full unedited birth story ahead)

On Sunday the 3rd, I was feeling pretty grouchy and emotional about still being pregnant. I finally made myself go to bed around 10 AM. Yes, I know, bad me. Blame it on being huge and uncomfortable. It's kind of hard to fall asleep with a big baby in there. Anyway, I woke up again around 1:30 or so and started having regular 5 minute apart contractions around 2. After a couple of hours of this, we decided to get ready to go. Of course, it took much longer than we expected to get all the last minute things packed up for us and for Emma. We took her over to Nathan and Jessica's, then headed out to the hospital. By the time I finally got checked in to Labor and Delivery, it was about 6 PM.

When we got there, I was about 4-5 cm dilated and almost completely effaced. My water bag's membrane was really thin, so my OB (who happened to be on-call that night, much to my satisfaction) asked if I wanted it broken. I said sure - that way they HAD to keep me LOL! It was certainly an odd sensation. It was like peeing a LOT at once and having no muscular control over it whatsoever. Anyway. I'm sure you all wanted to know that. Then I waddled from the exam room to my labor and delivery room. I got an IV and had to wait for the anesthesiologist for my epidural. Once I got my epidural, life was great:) Though at one point, we tried to let me sit up and use the computer, and my blood pressure dropped, I felt dizzy and nauseous, and then threw up. So no compy use for me while in labor:( I read a bit and tried (unsuccessfully) to sleep. It's hard to fall asleep when the blood pressure cuff is set to go off every 15 minutes.

Anyway. I kept having contractions, but they weren't as regular or close as they wanted them to be. And I was stuck at a 5 for a long time. So they put me on a little pitocin. But baby Hyrum didn't like that; his heart rate dropped during pitocin contractions. So they had to shut it off and put me on oxygen for awhile. We went through that cycle a few times during my labor. When the nurse used a catheter on me, dilation picked up again and I went to a 6 almost instantly. It still took a long time for me to dilate all the way, though. Part of that is because he's just SO big and his head was literally RIGHT there, which apparently can actually slow down dilation.

When it was finally time to push, they thought he was posterior. Which means longer, more difficult pushing. Yay. We're not sure if he actually was or not, now; he's just so big that either he SEEMED to be posterior or he turned at the last minute. Either way, pushing out a 9 lbs 12 oz baby is NOT easy! I pushed for about an hour. He's so big that my OB had to keep pulling to get his chest out - usually babies just slide out once the head is through. Thankfully, nothing got broken in the process, as can sometimes happen with bigger babies. I only got a 2nd degree tear this time, too - definitely better than the 4th degree I had with Emma!

Because of his size, they had to test his sugar levels periodically to make sure he could regulate it on his own. They wanted 4 good tests in a row. He aced the first, but was a little low on the second - meaning we had to start over. And they made him take a little bit of formula to get it back up:( As much as I hate formula, I'd rather that than have him stuck in the NICU hooked up to monitors and IVs. But he passed all the other tests beautifully and no more nasty formula for us! Like his sister, Hyrum did NOT like the formula:) Yeah, I'm proud of my kids; they know what's good for them. (Sorry, very anti-formula mom here.)

Hyrum's 2nd day was the first day of winter semester for John. He planned on coming back to the hospital shortly after he was done with classes for the day, but he got a flat tire on the way to school! We have NO idea how it happened, but there was a 2" gash on the side of the tire. Dude, what is up with us and car problems when we have a new baby? Though I'd MUCH rather deal with a flat tire than, oh, a totalled car. Rolling the car 8 days postpartum is NOT a good idea, just so you know. I definitely don't want to repeat THAT experience. Though in a twisted way, that actually helped us out this time. See, when we rolled our 05 Corolla, we had studded snow tires on it. We had the original tires in our apartment. So when we got an 06 Corolla - which is the exact same body style - we kept the tires for future use. We had to replace one once before, and were able to use one of THOSE tires to replace the gashed tire this week. All in all, it only cost us about $11 to fix.

But of course, that kept John away from us most of the day:( Hyrum and I spent the day nursing and sleeping curled up together. As annoyed as I was about John not being there (which of course wasn't his fault), it was nice to have some one-on-one bonding time with my new baby. And let me tell you, this kid can eat! He ate constantly that day! But it made my milk come in faster - it was in by the end of the day.

As I expected, Emma absolutely ADORES her little brother. She always wants to help with him. Or rather, she wants to take care of him all by herself! She keeps saying, "I hold him" or "I want baby" or "no I do it." She's even said "my baby." LOL, the funniest is when she gets mad at me for feeding him because SHE wants to do it! Um, sorry Em, but 2 year olds can't lactate;) She threw the biggest fit over it, though. That was NOT so funny. But she was really tired at the time. I'm trying to explain to her that only Mommy can feed him because only Mommy makes the special milk he needs. But yeah, she always wants to hold him and cuddle him and kiss him and point out all his little body parts. It's adorable:D

Anyway, now for what I know you REALLY want - pictures!! These are my Project 365 pictures for the rest of the week. I'll post more pictures later, but for now, this is what you get:

January 3

When we realized we wouldn't be having him till the next day, therefore not allowing us to have any newborn pics until then, we decided to take a picture of the contractions log (thanks to Kimi for the idea:)).

January 4

John and newborn baby Hyrum! John is on the phone with his mom, telling her all about little Hyrum's arrival.

January 5

John helping Emma hold Hyrum for the first time. Doesn't she look SO proud to be a big sister?

January 6

Little Hyrum getting ready to go home. I took TONS of adorable pics of him like this:) Doesn't he have the cutest, chubbiest kissable cheeks ever? <3

January 7

Emma and Hyrum:) Can you tell she adores him?

And that's it for now! Both kids are sleeping - I should take advantage of that fact and get some sleep myself. I hope to get more pics and my first Project 365 week LO posted tomorrow, so stay tuned!