Miriam

So I started having contractions similar to when I was in labor with Isaac. Although I know that every labor is different, for some reason I assumed that this meant the entire thing would be the same as Isaac's.

I began with the back labor, as I always do. Wednesday night, my mom spent the night just in case. I was up quite a bit with contractions about 5-7 minutes apart for much of the night, but eventually they moved further apart and I got some sleep.

The way I have known when to go to the hospital with the other babies was if I would lay down and contractions were STILL close together, then it was time. With this one however, I would lay down and they would be 15-20 min apart, but REALLY intense, 1 minute long contractions. When I would walk around, they would be 5 minutes apart.

So confusing.

I took some Kali Carbonicum, but it may have been too soon because I didn't feel the baby rotate like I did with Isaac (a truly bizarre but amazing feeling).

Finally, at about 11am we went over to Special Beginnings to get checked (we saw Becky Lopiccolo on the road on the way there), and I was a good 5 centimeters. I thought this was great and would have the baby pretty soon. With Isaac, I was 6 centimeters when I got to the hospital and I had him about 1 hour later.

This time, I was checked again at the hospital (about 12pm) and was 6, so I was thinking I would have this baby by 1:00. Not true! I was 8 centimeters for the next 2 hours!!! NOT FUN!!!

I guess it is never a good idea to have a time in your head that you will be finished and keep looking at the clock.

Max says that every time I'm in labor I say two things: "I can't do this!" and "I'm never doing this again!" This time I also said, "remind me next time to get an epidural"

When all is said and done, however, it is SOO worth it. We had a baby girl! The midwife and the nurse said, "dad, what is it?" And Max said, um . . . . is it a girl?, completely dumbfounded. The nurse said it was the funniest reaction she had ever seen.














Every time we have a new baby, I forget many things like how much breastfeeding hurts, how many diapers they go through in a day, and how tiny they start out. They always make the current "baby" seem like a giant. Miriam was 7 lbs 4 oz, so she was by far the smallest. 1 lb is a huge different at that age, so it was a little bizarre to have such a tiny baby.