Our little Noah arrived Noah arrived on Wednesday, Dec. 3, 2008 at 2:33 pm. He weighed 7lbs 0 oz and was 19.9 inches long.
After a long active labor of about 24 hours, Noah finally made his appearance. We arrived at the hospital around 3:00 am on Wednesday morning and were admitted at 3:30 am. Jen had progressed from the week before and was dilated to 4cm. Once admitted, we started to walk the halls right away to encourage faster dilation, but after an hour of this and the constant nausea, we decided to go back to the room and try the bouncy ball. By 6:30 am, we were both so tired, more Jenny than Eric, that we were worried about how much energy Jen would have for the final push. At this point we decided to get an epidural, the only problem was that we had to wait about an hour before anesthesia would be available for us due to the shift change in hospital staff. Once Jen received her epidural, which was around 8:30 am, she started to perk right up! We then found out she was dilated at 7cm which was great to hear. We were definitely on our way! With Jenny on the epidural drip, we decided to get some rest. We brought a cot in for Eric and both of us tried to sleep. We were ALMOST able to sleep, except for the nurses coming in every 20 minutes to check on Jenny and turn her to ensure the epidural medication would not pool on one side. So much for getting some sleep! By 10:30 am, Jenny had dilated to 9cm. But unfortunately she got stuck at 9cm for three hours. Baby Noah decided to give us all a scare because his heart rate stared dropping after every contraction. The OB docs came in to meet us and talk to us about the possibility of an emergency c-section. We agreed that if it was medically necessary we would go ahead, but that we would continue to watch and see if we could still have a natural birth. Finally, Jen reached 10cm just before 2 pm. With a room full of doctors, nurses and our midwife, Jen pushed for only 38 minutes and our beautiful baby boy was born.
Noah gave us another scare when he developed jaundice which worsened after we were discharged from the hospital. Because of this, Noah has had almost daily visits to the doctor and lactation consultants and he had to have phototherapy at home. Noah wore a light belt around his whole torso to help him eliminate the jaundice. The light around Noah glowed blue around him at night and so we lovingly called him our little Blue Ray Boy. He is now off the phototheraphy and is beginning to look like a little rosy-cheeked baby, instead of a little pumpkin. Noah had his jaundice evaluated once again today and it was good news. He has improved so much that he didn't need to have his heal pricked to check his bilirubin level. His skin tone has returned to normal and the whites of his eyes are almost clear of the yellowish tinge.
Learning to nurse has been an experience for all of us. Noah, Mom and Dad are doing their best to figure it out. Noah lost quite a bit of weight in his first two days (10% of his total weight) and became dehydrated. We've been supplementing nursing with several feeding methods including using a tiny little tube to feed him while he's sucking on Daddy's finger. Today Noah is back to his birth weight now and we're all very glad. He's been gaining about an ounce per day which is the desired amount for a baby his age, so he's right on track now. We have officially graduated from the lactation consultant. We have a few more things to work on before Noah is nursing exactly how he should be, but we are reassured to know that he can down almost 2 ounces of Mommy's milk in about 12 minutes.
Life has been a bit chaotic since Noah arrived, but we wouldn't have it any other way. We love him more than we could have imagined and more. We are both so happy to finally have him in our lives.
Below is the link to the photos that were taken at Regions Hospital. Check them out if you're interested.
http://www.our365.com/NewbornPortraits/BabyDetail.aspx?birthid= b1743702-ff93-490f-9d37-e36849ccb359&babyid=a6e9db3e-59ad- 44f8-92ce-716738c53725
