Jaxon

Look who arrived!!

Its been just over a week since Jaxon Daniel Kemp was born. & he has been an angel, hardly cries, eats well, bright eyes & happy to interact when he's awake.

I'll try to piece together my labor, but i don't know how much is accurate - due to lack of sleep & lots of meds.

I started having contractions on the 11th around 8am. they were happening every 45 minutes, but they disappeared after an hour and a half. so I went about my day and I had them randomly, i knew they were real contractions & not braxton hicks, because of the pain.

Dan & I went to prenatal class anyways, & just before we left to go to prenatal (6:15pmish) i started having stronger contractions. which continued every half hour through prenatal class, the teacher suggested that it wasn't real. I knew it was.

I tried to go to bed that evening, but my contractions were up to 6 minutes apart & we headed to hospital around 1am

the nurse in the hospital told Dan not to bring the bags in because I likely wasn't staying, that I had barely dilated (still my contractions were 5 minutes apart at this point, i wasn't about to turn around and head home) but I think she measured me wrong. a second nurse came in and she measured a larger dilation almost immediately. they gave me some morphine & hooked me up to everything.

we waited. the contractions were so bad after 3:30am, i was like begging for the epidural. The nurse measured me at 4am, said i was 4cm dilated so that was enough to get me an epidural. which i waited (in agony!) for, for an hour. because apparently they have to call someone in to do that. so i went through a lot of strong contractions, and the dr who was going to do the epidural showed up around 5am. they rechecked me & i think I had gotten to 8cm dilated at that point & because of that they were afraid I was going to have the baby before the epidural could take effect (half hour)

so he offered me a spinal tap, which I tried to ask if I could have anything else if it didn't last or work, and he danced around answering. so I got this spinal tap, it numbed me for an hour & a half. and then faded. I was right back in pain and barely advancing. they gave me more morphine, a needle in my bum, & some in the IV, and they offered me gas for the pain. which did nothing and it was pissing me off. my feet were numb still, and now my head was spinning but my stomach was still in so much pain. it wasn't working

i was yelling. a lot. i know i was. eventually a new dr came in (with the shift change potentially) to see if he could help me. at this point I had dilated to 9cm, and he said if i could sit still, he would give me an epidural.

it seemed like my only option, i literally didn't know how i was going to make it through without one. they had me sit up on the side of the bed and hold Dans hands. I was shaking. They used an ultrasound machine to see my spine, because I was so shaky, they wanted to make sure they were lining up right. I got the epidural in, and it killed my labor.

i slept off & on until noon, and then they wanted me to push when my contractions had resurfaced. Dan was an absolute dream through it all. he counted for me when I was pushing, he reminded me about breathing, my legs, everything. he knew more about what was going on than I did.

My mom came with us for the whole night. I'm grateful. My moms my best friend, having her there meant a lot. I felt bad for her missing out on sleep & stuff, but we were all so happy to welcome Jaxon into this world. He arrived at 2:12pm on the 12th. The day before his daddys birthday.

Dr. Jones pulled him out ('sunny side up', face up, harder labor, I guess most have C sections because the labor becomes so complicated) and held him upside down "well, what is it?"
i said "it's a boy"

Dan & I couldnt be more happy & proud of our little boy & our little family <3

He was only 5lbs 15 oz at birth. & 20 inches long. and absolutely perfect