Henry James Wright born on Friday, 7/17, at 6:35 p.m.  He weighed 8 pounds, 10 ounces.  Body length was 21.5 inches, head measurement was 14 inches.

The doctors and nurses kept marvelling at how blonde his hair was and what a big baby he was.  No one really guessed, including me, that I had been walking around carrying nearly 9 pounds of baby.  :)

You can see pictures of him here.

Love, Trina

I started having contractions early on 7/16.  They were coming frequently enough and painfully enough by breakfast that I thought 7/16 was going to be the day; however, by noon-ish they peetered out.  After a nap, the contractions started up again, this time even harder and more consistent, but by bedtime, I still hadn't reached the golden 5-1-1 we learned about in class.  I laid down, but never did sleep because every 7 minutes or so, I'd have to breath through a contraction.

At 12:39 on 7/17, my water broke.  When went on over to the hospital, the doctor and triage nurse recommended we walk around the hospital for 1-2 hours in order to get my contractions closer together.  Walking around for that long brought them to 2-3 minutes apart, but as soon as I sat down, they'd spread back out again.  My inconsistent contractions would be a theme for the entire labor.

After 2 hours of walking around, and going on 24 hours with only 1 hour of sleep, I was quite tired, and they finally checked me into the delivery room.  The nurse, John, and I discussed the birth plan, which I must admit I wrote thinking I would have a lot more energy than I actually had.  By 5:30, all I wanted to do was sleep, which was impossible with the contractions, and laying down with them was plain uncomfortable.  At that point, I cried uncle, and asked for an epidural.  Then I slept.  That was nice.

At some point, the doctor ended up administering pitocin to hurry my contractions up.  For whatever reason, getting my contractions even was really hard.  I spent hours dilated at 1 measly centimeter.  When the nurse who had been with us for most of the labor went on lunch break, she was very explicit with the relief nurse not to touch anything because she had spent the whole morning trying to find the pitocin sweet spot.

Since there wasn't much to do, John and I slept a lot.  Waited around.  Listened to music.  Visited with my parents who were in an out.

Eventually it was time to push.  After about an hour of pushing, the doctor came in for delivery and baby boy was born.  Hooray!

Today we saw the ringer of the ringer in terms of doctors at the OB office since the doctor I have been seeing, who is covering for the doctor who went on maternity leave, is on vacation this week.  I joked that the more of the doctors I see, the fewer of them will be strangers on baby day--whenever that may be.  She discussed with John and me the pros and cons of induction and the pros and cons of the timing of it.  Then we made a plan: I will be admitted to the hospital on 7/22 to receive prostaglandin and then start the induction on 7/23.

After we made our plan, the doctor declared that figuring out when the baby will come is a bunch of hocus pocus, and I may just happen to deliver this weekend.  We'll see.

Speaking of hocus pocus, my massage therapist focused on special labor-inducing pressure points yesterday.  I doubt that did anything since there is still a baby inside me today, but the massage did feel nice.

Yesterday and today my parents and I ran some errands, returned some duplicate baby gifts and purchased some needed items that I deemed too boring to register for, like baby wipes and baby tylenol.  We also went to JoAnn Fabrics for swaddle blanket material, which my mom and I sewed up today.  They're super cute and cuddly.  Can't wait to wrap Little Baby in them.

Cross your fingers he comes soon.  We're all getting antsy.
Love, Trina

My parents arrived Thursday afternoon, and we've been spending time visiting, walking, and organizing baby things.  It's tricky to sitesee since we're waiting for baby to make his move into the world, and thus ideally would prefer not to be too far from the hospital.

At my last appointment, my doctor said that at my next appointment, which is Tuesday, we will discuss the hows and whys of induction and then schedule an induction for her on-call day the week of the 20th, which I think will be 7/22.  So the current plan is, if the baby doesn't come in the meantime, he will be born the week after next.  Until then, we wait.  And walk.  John says I need to have a sterner discussion with the baby about how he needs to get his butt in gear. 

It's rather warm today in Seattle.  Nevertheless, John, my parents, the dogs, and I went walking around Seward Park this morning.  We may escape the heat for a little while by seeing a movie.  John and my dad set up the window air conditioner, so I have been able to seek refuge in the bedroom if I get too uncomfortable, which is nice.

Love, Trina

Trina on Fourth of July in the only red shirt that fits:
     

Since John and I both have larger than average heads, we have concurred that Little Baby having a big head is inevitable.  The question, though, is will he have John's koomunga melon head OR will he have my alien baby head?  We shall see....

Love, Trina

No, alas, my absence from the blog does not mean the baby was born.  He's still chillin'.  My doctor joked at my last appointment that I must have made a cozy home for him since he doesn't seem to want to leave. 

In the meantime, I have read through Penny Simkin's the Birth Partner, which John is now reading.  Of course, now that John has been reading it, he's been quizzing me on birthing things and declared the other day that he was going to birth partner the shit out of this labor.

We've been carrying on with getting things ready for my parents and baby to arrive.  This weekend we picked up the changing table and put that together.  Woo!  Let's see, what else....  I've been TiVoing movies in anticipation of being up in the middle of the night and not wanting to watch infomercials.  I've been working on super belated thank you cards.  John mowed the lawn.  We've both been cleaning.  Ooh!  Finally got the coffeetable moved back into the living room.  I missed it immensely.

Fourth of July was pretty relaxed.  We had Ian over for burgers, hung out.  Some neighbors one block over had quite the fireworks show going on, which didn't make the dogs super happy.  But we all fell asleep nevertheless.

It's been incredibly hot the last few days.  Much hotter than Seattle normally is, and hot enough that I've been a little grumpy and a lot tired.  Looks like it's going to cool off tomorrow, which would be wonderful.

Last Thursday was my last day at the office.  This week I'll be puttering around the house waiting for baby to make his move.
Love, Trina