and these are the days of our lives...

4 weeks ago I welcomed someone incredibly amazing into my life. I wanted to share her birth story so that one day, she can look back on this post and see how she changed two peoples lives for the better. Scott and I could not love anything more!

On Tuesday July 14th, I was scheduled to be induced. Scott and I had dinner with all our friends in Tuesday Night Dinner bunch at Old Mill. Surprisingly, we were both very calm considering we were soon to be holding a baby! We got to Flowers Hospital and met our great nurse Whitney. (Really...she was so fabulous!) Dr. Nichols came in after we got settled and explained how Cervadil works and inserted it so that I could begin to dilate. Mom, Heather, Debbie and Lee J came up to keep me company and make me laugh and Brandi B was on her way from Gainesville to be here for the birth. Everyone left when I got to have my Ambien to sleep.... and everyone was so excited because the next day would be a birth... or so we thought!

Wednesday morning Dr. Mullins came in early and broke my water and I was not dilated. Oh... and this is when contractions started. I (for some reason) would not get the epidural right away, even though Scott was begging me to get it and promising me we would never have another child! As soon as Mom got there she convinced me to get the epi and good lord, I am so glad I did! I went from pain city to "feeling like I was at the beach!" By mid morning, all my good friends and family had come to be there for the birth of LC. Everyone was taking bets on when she would get here. I labored with no pain all day long. Yes. all. day. long. I think I finally dilated to 3 cm at midnight that night. The best part was, all my friends and family stayed. I think the waiting room was full of my friends and family. It was great knowing they were all there to support us!

Finally, around 11:30 pm, Dr. Mullins said it was time to do a c-section because LC was not moving into position, I was not dilating, and by this point, I was running a low fever and LC's heart rate was slowing down. We said good-bye to all our friends, said a prayer, cried some tears and they wheeled me to L&D.

I had watched enough "Deliver Me's" on Discovery so I knew exactly what was going to happen. At 1:03am, Lucy Clare made her entrance into the world. She and Scott went to the nursery while they finished with me. I think this is when my husband became a mushball and fell in total love with his baby! :) All that waiting for my friends and family was now over as everyone stared into the nursery window at sweet baby Lucy! After they finished with me, they moved me back to the room and I was able to hold and nurse LC. It was such an amazing feeling! By this time, it was close to 3 in the morning. I had labored for 17 hours and been up for almost 24. I was exhausted. By the time we got to our real room it was almost 4 am. We loved on Lucy and I fed her and I crashed!

A few days later I became anemic and Lucy started losing too much weight due to my not producing enough milk. While I was very scared, I had a wonderful nurse named Angie who was my angel. She took such good care of me and was so patient as I learned to breastfeed, and later when she brought the news that I needed to give LC some formula, she was there to teach me to pump and help me emotionally through all the scary stuff. She was definitely a life saver and was my sweet angel! I am forever grateful to her!

Lucy and I were finally discharged on Monday, July 20th. She is the most laid back wonderful baby! She loves to be held, loves to hear me sing, and eats and sleeps like a champ. I am so in love.

I have slowly been recovering from the c-section. I have really good days and days I am really sore. All in all, it has been really good.

And it was so worth the long labor and the pain for my sweet little girl!
Much love to all these people who stuck in out at the hospital:

Mom, Dad, Heather, Lee J, Brandi B, Debbie, Amy, Grant, Alicia P, Caroline G, Brandy R, Grant M

Love all of you!