Born Yesterday (1993) . . .

On Friday, September 19, 2008, Kristy woke up at 1:30 am with a jolt of labor pain. Over the next few hours the contractions grew stronger and stronger, so since our plan was to try to go into labor on Friday anyway as our OB said he would "meddle" if she was able to achieve contractions that show up on the monitor and she would be at 37 weeks and considered full term and the baby was already estimated at 8lbs. 4 oz. We knew that the OB wasn't on call Thursday night/Friday morning but his office hours start at 8am. So, we attempted to delay long enough so that we wouldn't be in assessment long enough for the contractions to stop and result in a discharge.

At 4:30am, we attempted to go to Waffle House as it was the only non-fast food place that Kristy felt she could scarf some grub before being deprived of food for 24 to 36 hours. We should have seen the foreshadowing of the majority of the rest of our day as when we walked in we were greeted with, "the grill is down, sorry".

So, we scooted down the road to the International House of Pancakes as it was the other non-fast food place that was open (Harvest Grain Pancakes, mmmmmmm). Kristy was having pretty regular contractions during the meal and a gentleman across the restaurant kept smiling at us. As we were preparing to leave, Kristy made a quick trip to the restroom. I then took Ander in to the restroom to wash his hands as he was coated in syrup. During this time, the aforementioned gentleman approached Kristy and asked if she was going into labor soon. Kristy told him we were on the way to the hospital. He then smiled, walked over to our waitress, asked for our check, and paid for it, saying "tell the baby happy birthday for me". The wait staff was all abuzz after this, "that never happens at the IHOP". Hmmm, I think there is a potential radio jingle in there somewhere.

At 5:45am we checked into the Woman's Hospital Assessment Center. Kristy's sister-in-law Sunny showed up to sit with Ander in the waiting area. After a quick check, she was pronounced to be at 3cm and the contractions were coming every 2 to 6 minutes for 40 to 100 seconds in duration. At 8am when the doctor came into his office, he ordered that she should be moved up to Labor and Delivery for monitoring.

At 8:15, the L&D nurse informed us that looking at Kristy's progress (still at 3 cm), she was pretty sure the doc would discharge her and send her home. The doctor came by at 8:50, did a check, and we believe lied declaring that she was at 4cm and progressing nicely (thanks doc!). He said that we would definitely have the baby today and that he would watch her for awhile, see how she progressed on her own and break her water or introduce pitocin to get things moving.

[Editor note: You can click photos anywhere to maximize, it is getting cut off for some reason.]

[Ander is very excited about this new adventure]
[I think I hear that baby!]
[I'm hungry Mommy! Gimme some hand!]

At noon, the contractions were getting strong enough that Kristy asked for an epidural. At 1:20 pm, the doctor came by again to check progress. Kristy was at 4cm so he decided to go ahead and break the water. At that point, Kristy announced that she had started gushing, which she humorously pronounces at gooshing.

At 3:30, Kristy had progressed to 7cm dilated. They gave her a low dose of pitocin to keep things progressing.

At 5:45, they checked and she was dilated to 9.5cm. The nurse came back at 6:00, checked again, asked Kristy to push a few times, and announced she was at 10cm.

[Getting ready to push!]

At 6:15, Kristy started pushing. She struggled valiantly, turning red, blue then purple but at 6:50 the baby wasn't moving much so they called a break. At 7:05 she started again and pushed until near 8:00. They thought the baby was face up, rather than face down, a harder position to deliver from. But they couldn't get enough of the head through to get an accurate feeling for the baby's positioning. At 8:00 the doctor talked to us and we were pretty much already resigned to the c-section. Kristy pushed for a bit more with him monitoring. He said Kristy was pushing great and the baby would descend a little bit but the second she stopped he popped back up. He could also tell from Kristy's lopsided belly that the baby was likely engaged sideways in the pelvis.

At 8:15 they started prep for the c-section.

[Quite the fashion statement, I'd say!]
[And look, non-skid strips on the bottom of my boots!]

At 9:18pm, the baby came into the world with a small cry and a lot of grunting. I was able to watch the baby get cleaned up and checked out while Kristy was sewn up. He scored an 8/9 on the APGAR (much better than Ander's initial 2). He looks a lot like Ander did at birth (though a little plumper but a bit less puffy). He was 7 lbs. 14.2 oz. He measured at 21 inches long (they said he'll lose half an inch today after the swelling on his head goes down). From the bulge on the side of his head, the nurses said that it looked like he was trying to come through with his head sideways (the cone is kind of on the side of his head, halfway between his ear the the crown if his head).


[I'm in love!]

After cleanup, they let Kristy hold the baby on the stretcher and took him down to meet the family. A few minutes visit there and Kristy was off to recovery and the baby was off to the transition nursery. I met the family outside the transition nursery and we watched them give the baby a bath and coninue monitoring his vitals. I picked Ander up to let him watch the baby through the window, "they're giving him a bath Daddy", and then "that baby has a penis!!!".

At around midnight the nurse in transition asked me to pick up the phone outside the nursery. She informed me that the baby was breathing way too fast, they had called the pediatrician and been ordered to do some lab work and monitor him for several more hours. Kristy got back to the room at around the same time and I let her know it would probably be about 4 hours at the earliest before the baby came back to the room. We tried to get some sleep. I was more successful at getting sleep because the nurses were still checking on Kristy pretty frequently.

At 1:30 I woke up to hear Kristy crying. The transition nursery had just called to say the baby was being moved to NICU. This, of course, being Kristy's worst nightmare and the ONE THING we didn't want to happen. They reported that the baby had tested positive for Group B Strep, despite them giving Kristy three bags of antibiotics to prevent the transmission of GBS AND despite the fact that it is much more rare for GBS to be transferred to a baby delivered through c-section.

Kristy made the nurses get her out of bed so we could go down to visit. The baby seemed to be quite calm and not having much problem outside of breathing rapidly. He has to have a consistent respiratory rate of 70 or under but he is currently reading 90 to 110. They were feeding him through a gavage (tube) down his mouth and throat because he can't suckle while breathing that rapidly.

At that point, we came back to the room and grabbed 3 hours of sleep. We went back down to the NICU this morning at 7:15. He now has a gavage inserted through the nose. We're certain that he'll be fed this way long enough to cause him to lose his urge to suckle, thus requiring him to have occupational therapy to learn how to breastfeed or suck a bottle (just like happened with Ander). We once again have the largest, healthiest baby in the NICU. A honking almost 8 pounder surrounded by preemies weighing 2 to 4 pounds.

On the way out we ran into his pediatrician and spoke with her briefly. She pretty much confirmed we're just going to be in a wait and see mode. We're hoping his breathing gets under control by the time the neonatologists make rounds at 4pm this afternoon but we're resigned to another long stay in the NICU/Special Care Nursery. sigh

Just now at 11:30 the neonatologist called and informed us that the xrays were inconclusive for pneumonia and that they will be starting the baby on a 7 day treatment of antibiotics in case so he will definitely not be leaving the hospital for a week. If he gets out of NICU because his breathing improves before Kristy is discharged, they will put the baby in our room and let us stay. If Kristy is discharged first, we will not be able to room-in with him. Argh!

For those of you who are local, I would ask that you not come by to visit unless we call or notify here that we're ready for visitors. We've only slept about four to six hours in the last 50. The baby isn't with us anyway and we're just exhausted. Plus Kristy has SOOOO many family members that we're already going to be stretched trying to take care of "mandatory" visitors.

Okay, so I guess that brings everything up to date. We'll be back later with additional information . . .

Oh, that's right . . . the name. Well, since he was born on National Talk Like a Pirate Day, we changed our minds and narrowed it down to Edward Teach (aka Blackbeard), Barbarossa (aka Redbeard) or Henry Morgan.

Then we came to our senses and went with our originally chosen name. So without further ado, introducing, Lochlan Reilly. He'll be called Loch or Loki, depending on which of us you speak to.

And yes, we've ALREADY been hit with jokes about Loch Ness, Lock Box, etc. etc. etc.