Click here for some pictures from Week 2! Enjoy!
Week 2
Monday, October 29, 2007
Friday, October 26, 2007
My Labor Story
Saturday morning I went garage saleing with my friend Anissa. At about noon we had finished hunting for “baby treasures”, and I headed home because I wasn’t feeling very well. I felt like I was coming down with the flu or a cold – achy, headache, tired, crampy. Dan had worked overnight on Friday night, so he was sleeping when I got home. I decided to take a nap too. When we woke up around 3 pm, I still felt off, but we started puttering around the house. We hadn’t taken any pictures of my belly in a few weeks, so we decided to do that. 
10/13/2007 4:23pm
Around this time, my cramps started feeling worse. I remember Daniel saying as he was taking my picture, “Try not to look like you’re in pain for this one.” I still just thought I was getting sick or having Braxton-Hicks because the cramps weren’t like what they had described in our childbirth class or like what I expected, but they did seem to be getting more intense.
It seems like so many first time moms end up at the hospital with a false alarm and I didn’t want to get my hopes up only to get sent home, so I kept telling myself that I couldn’t be in labor, it was too early. Dan, in PA mode, offered to check and see if I was in labor. I was 5 cm dilated. At that point he knew we would be having a baby in the next 24 hours or so, but still I was sort of in denial. Thinking that we still had hours of early labor ahead of us, we thought we’d go to the beach to pass some time before heading to the hospital. Dan left to go buy bait so he could fish and I stayed home to get ready to go because I was moving kind of slow. By the time he got back, about 5 pm, I was laying in the bed, breathing through contractions. We started timing contractions, and they were about three minutes apart and a minute long and getting more intense. Our doctor had told us to call the office answering service if we thought I was in labor, and then a nurse would call back to determine if we needed to head to the hospital. Dan called the answering service and while we were waiting for them to call back, he started gathering the rest of the stuff to take to the hospital. It took him a long time to get everything together because he had to stop every 2-3 minutes to help me through the contractions. I was on my hands and knees on our bedroom floor during the contractions and trying to help him locate stuff for our hospital bags in between. We finally had our bags packed, but the doctor’s office still hadn’t called us back. The contractions were pretty intense, so we decided we’d better head to the hospital anyway.
We got to the hospital around 6pm. When we walked in, the nurse at the front desk asked, “Are you here to visit someone?” Daniel said, “No, we think we’re here to have a baby.” They examined me, decided we were right, and took me to a delivery room. I was still at about 5-6 cm. The contractions were really intense and painful by then. Daniel was a great coach. All the nurses kept saying that they were going to hire him out as a birth coach. They asked me if I was planning on getting an epidural, and I said that I didn’t know yet. The contractions got more and more intense, and I had no idea if I was progressing or not. I felt like I could handle it for another hour or two without drugs, but not if I was looking at 14 more hours of labor or something like that. I figured I surely had several more hours of labor ahead of me, so after a little while, I asked the nurse for the epidural, but I had to wait until I finished the IV of antibiotics for Group B Strep before they could start it. Just after that my water broke. The nurse checked me and said I was completely dilated and could start pushing if I wanted to, even though the doctor hadn’t arrived yet! So much for the epidural – there wasn’t time! I didn’t really have the urge to push though, so I just kept breathing through contractions and saying things to Dan like, “I hate this.” and “This is bad.” He’d tell me to relax whatever part of my body I was tensing up, and I’d say, “I can’t.”, but then would relax that part. A little after 7 pm, the doctor arrived and told me it was time to push. I pushed through about 4-5 contractions and at 7:25 pm our precious baby boy was born.
It was a short, intense labor, not at all what I was expecting, but looking back, I wouldn’t change anything about the way that it happened. Who can complain about being in labor for only 4 or 5 hours? Of course, we’ll have to be careful the next time around because I think second babies usually come faster!
It seems like so many first time moms end up at the hospital with a false alarm and I didn’t want to get my hopes up only to get sent home, so I kept telling myself that I couldn’t be in labor, it was too early. Dan, in PA mode, offered to check and see if I was in labor. I was 5 cm dilated. At that point he knew we would be having a baby in the next 24 hours or so, but still I was sort of in denial. Thinking that we still had hours of early labor ahead of us, we thought we’d go to the beach to pass some time before heading to the hospital. Dan left to go buy bait so he could fish and I stayed home to get ready to go because I was moving kind of slow. By the time he got back, about 5 pm, I was laying in the bed, breathing through contractions. We started timing contractions, and they were about three minutes apart and a minute long and getting more intense. Our doctor had told us to call the office answering service if we thought I was in labor, and then a nurse would call back to determine if we needed to head to the hospital. Dan called the answering service and while we were waiting for them to call back, he started gathering the rest of the stuff to take to the hospital. It took him a long time to get everything together because he had to stop every 2-3 minutes to help me through the contractions. I was on my hands and knees on our bedroom floor during the contractions and trying to help him locate stuff for our hospital bags in between. We finally had our bags packed, but the doctor’s office still hadn’t called us back. The contractions were pretty intense, so we decided we’d better head to the hospital anyway.
We got to the hospital around 6pm. When we walked in, the nurse at the front desk asked, “Are you here to visit someone?” Daniel said, “No, we think we’re here to have a baby.” They examined me, decided we were right, and took me to a delivery room. I was still at about 5-6 cm. The contractions were really intense and painful by then. Daniel was a great coach. All the nurses kept saying that they were going to hire him out as a birth coach. They asked me if I was planning on getting an epidural, and I said that I didn’t know yet. The contractions got more and more intense, and I had no idea if I was progressing or not. I felt like I could handle it for another hour or two without drugs, but not if I was looking at 14 more hours of labor or something like that. I figured I surely had several more hours of labor ahead of me, so after a little while, I asked the nurse for the epidural, but I had to wait until I finished the IV of antibiotics for Group B Strep before they could start it. Just after that my water broke. The nurse checked me and said I was completely dilated and could start pushing if I wanted to, even though the doctor hadn’t arrived yet! So much for the epidural – there wasn’t time! I didn’t really have the urge to push though, so I just kept breathing through contractions and saying things to Dan like, “I hate this.” and “This is bad.” He’d tell me to relax whatever part of my body I was tensing up, and I’d say, “I can’t.”, but then would relax that part. A little after 7 pm, the doctor arrived and told me it was time to push. I pushed through about 4-5 contractions and at 7:25 pm our precious baby boy was born.
It was a short, intense labor, not at all what I was expecting, but looking back, I wouldn’t change anything about the way that it happened. Who can complain about being in labor for only 4 or 5 hours? Of course, we’ll have to be careful the next time around because I think second babies usually come faster!
10/13/2007 7:55pm
Thursday, October 25, 2007
Grandparents are great!
Papa and Gigi came to visit Joshua in the hospital.
Three generations of Kuder boysGrandma and Grandpa Nettleton came a few days later to meet their first grandchild.
After Joshua's first bath...
We took some videos on our camera, but they probably aren't too exciting for anyone other than us and the grandparents! This one is from after Joshua's first bath. He's wearing a gown that Daniel's grandma gave to him when he was born! He seems to really like bath time!
Mom is so proud!
Tuesday, October 23, 2007
Live Action
This is pretty much what we do all day...sit around and watch Joshua! I think this one is from Oct 16th, so he's about three days old!
Saturday, October 20, 2007
Saturday, October 06, 2007
Going bananas!
Our backyard has literally at least 35 banana trees in it (they're in the background of the latest post of my baby belly). Some of them (amazingly) produced bananas this year! So, for the past few weeks we've had an ABUNDANCE of bananas. We've already made two rounds of banana bread, chocolate covered bananas, eaten as many bananas as possible, and shared with friends, plus today I must have put at least 25 overripe ones in the freezer for future use...and there's more to come!
We "harvest" them when they're green and let them ripen in the garage. Doesn't this just look funny and totally tropical (do I really live here?)!
Close up
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