I wrote about my pregnancy a while back, then life got busy with doctor appointments, girly activities, Christmas shopping, bathroom remodels, feeling uncomfortable, and living life. Around 8 months, I realized that I wasn't sad about Down Syndrome anymore. I was nervous about all the things that could go wrong, but I was done being sad and I was excited to meet our new little lady.
There was a lot of uncertainty about baby girl's birth, but we were trying to be as prepared as possible. We had an induction scheduled for December 9th, which was 39 weeks. Dave talked to his professors about our situation so he could move his finals if we ended up in the NICU and Marie was coming to watch my girls. Well, Miss Indie had other plans.
Friday night (December 4), I was laying on the couch downstairs binge watching Chasing Life when I started feeling some cramping around 11 pm. The pain was manageable and I wasn't sure if it was actual labor so I just hung out downstairs for a while. Around 2 am, I headed upstairs to try to sleep, but the pain was getting severe so my tossing and turning woke up Dave. I asked Dave about his schedule for the next couple of days, we joked around for a while, debated who to call to watch the girls, I hopped in the shower, packed a hospital bag, and called my friend Erin at 4 am. She had offered to be my back-up, but admitted that she never slept near her phone. I decided to call her first since I knew they were free for the weekend and my girls love their kids. I was able to get a hold of Erin and she was so amazing to head right over and watch the girls most of Saturday.
Dave and I arrived at the hospital around 4:30 am, but the main entrance was completely deserted. Since I had never taken a tour, we just wandered around for a while until we found the labor and delivery area. Once we got set up in a room, I was checked and dilated to a 5. I was relieved that it wasn't a false alarm, excited to meet Indie, and still anxious about potential medical issues.
We hung out for a while with consistent contractions. I tried to send Dave for breakfast, but the nurses stopped him in the hall and offered me Popsicles instead, dang it! This was the second time that I should have eaten more before heading to the hospital! The contractions were getting painful so I requested my epidural, then everything was wonderful and pain-free. We chit chatted with the medical students for a while and the morning flew by. When I was checked again, they realized that I was complete and ready to deliver. Our OB was about 10 minutes away so they waited for him to arrive, broke my water, and asked me to push.
We were all planning on a quick delivery, but Indie's head was posterior with her face looking up and she didn't seem to want to budge. After a while, our OB mentioned a C-section, but I was adamant about a vaginal delivery. He told me I could be pushing for 3 hours and not see any progress so I just told him, I would rather have a difficult 3 hours then a hard c section recovery. Fortunately, he was able to use a Forcep to slowly rotate Indie with every push, though he was not optimistic about her progress. I continued pushing for about an hour, then on one push, they could see her progressing and everyone in the room got excited! She came out and I got to see her little face looking at me, all scrunched and angry about delivery. I heard her cry once, then she was quiet. The NICU team took her over to the corner to take a look at her. I started getting anxious so I asked if she was okay. It was such a huge relief when they handed her back to me and the NICU team left the room. They gave her to me for skin-to-skin and she snuggled right in. Her low muscle tone made her floppy and extra snuggly. Dave and I spent our time looking at her, loving her, and feeling so blissfully happy about her safe arrival.
After our bonding time, I wanted to resume my normal function and eat a huge meal. My body wasn't quite ready to move around so I had to take it easy for a while. They moved us to our recovery room where we spent the next 2 days. We continued to receive good news about Indie's health, which was such an incredible blessing. She had a minor cardio issue that resolved itself. Indie also failed her hearing test on her right ear, but that can be very common because of small ear canals, so I expected that and was glad that her left ear passed with no issues. Indie was doing so much better medically than I could have ever planned.
After spending months worrying about Down Syndrome, we got to meet our baby and fall in love with her, just the way she is.
Dave brought the girls to the hospital Saturday night and they instantly fell in love with their baby sister. They were only able to stay for a couple of hours so they came back on Sunday afternoon. Milan and Eden both wanted to hold Indie the whole time. Cora seemed more interested in uninterrupted screen time. Our friends, Kyle and Sara, also came by on Sunday to meet Indie. Dave was talking to Kyle, but he was completely tuned out staring at Indie.
One of our nurses, Charlene, also fell in love with Indie. She shared some stories of her son with special needs and spent a lot of time in our room snuggling Indie. I really enjoyed getting to know her during our stay.
Our birth experience was joyous. Our hospital stay was peaceful and relaxing. Bonding was Indie has been truly special and I am so grateful for our family.
