Baby V is here!

Went in on Friday, October 22 for a scheduled medical induction at 38 weeks. After 5 hours of laboring with pitocin, a fantastic epidural, and only experiencing severe shaking but no pain, little Baby V was born with TWO PUSHES!!! The nurse had told us at 11:51 a.m. that I was 5cm dilated. She was headed to lunch and told Mr. V and his sister to head out, too. They rolled me to my right side. I started feeling pressure every 30 seconds or so and mentioned something to the covering nurse. She checked and said “Oh, wow, you are complete!”. Yep, I’d gone from 5-10 in 20 minutes. I texted Mr. V and his sister, she called the doc, and she encouraged me to do something to avoid pushing. Good thing…

Doc came in with nurses and techs on her heels and Mr. V right behind. Barely got my feet in the stirrups and, pop, half of him was out! Small snip, one push and the rest of him came forth. Amazing. He had very healthy lungs and weighed in at 6lbs, 14oz and 19″. I had to have a tiny episiotomy but the recovery from that has been so much easier than the tearing and episiotomy I had with Pumpkinhead.

Actually, this whole experience has been 10,000 times better. Breastfeeding has been a lot more successful and my legs aren’t tree trunks like they were last time. When Pumpkinhead was born, he had pneumonia and couldn’t breathe. He spent a week in the NICU and I was on my feet most of the time, not resting and certainly not breastfeeding enough to build a supply. Baby V has been feeding every 1-3 hours on demand and I have been able to keep my feet up, sleep when he sleeps, etc. I can definitely feel the difference in how I feel overall.

Best of all, my cluster headaches appear (knock on wood!) to be gone. My head feels so much better. The constant band of pain and tension across my forehead and neck is gone and I’m not “hitting a wall” at a certain time of day. I’m also not nauseated the way I was. I’m still on painkillers for the birth-related pains but should be off those soon. I am so, so happy. This means I can spend some quality time with Pumpkinhead over the next few weeks while I am home. Amazingly, even with almost 4 months on bed rest, I was so sick and unable to drive so he really was shortchanged.

I’ve been trying to get this post written for three days now so I’m going to cut it short and let it rip.