The Beginning!

We were so happy to be expecting our first child, a girl, Leightyn Denise! I had a perfect pregnancy with little to no morning sickness, I got sick once, and everything looked great on all ultrasounds and Non Stress tests! On November 29, 2008 we had just returned from visiting family in Wadsworth for thanksgiving and made plans to go to the Zoo to see the Wildlights Christmas lighting display! I was set to be induced on November 4 (a week before my due date) due to some complications with high blood pressure in the last 2 weeks of my pregnancy so I was happy to get out of the house one last time before baby and spend time with my Mom, Sister, and Niece (hubby too)! We were planning on meeting about 5:30 so when I was getting ready around 4:00 I thought my water may have broke, but since this was my first baby and no one else in my family had their water break naturally, I just wasn’t sure. I felt great though so I decided we should go ahead and go to the Zoo and leave later if need be or if I felt anything. The lights were beautiful as always and my little sister got to try ice skating, I drank lots of yummy hot chocolate and walked around until about 9:30. I wanted to go to the last area and see if we could see any monkeys (still feeling great) but everyone else was getting chilly and the little ones were getting tired so we left. On our way to the car I felt my first little pain, then again and again but nothing too bothersome. We dropped my family back off to their car with the promise to head to the hospital as soon as we stopped at the house for my bag. Luckily my best friend had talked me into throwing some things in there the week before knowing I am such a procrastinator! When we got to the hospital they said my water had definitely broke and I was between 5-6 cm, so they got me a room, this was around 11:30. Once my nurse got me all set up in the room she went to lunch, thinking as we did, that there was still plenty of time. Apparently the first ones usually take a while! Around midnight I was feeling intense pain for the first time and called for my nurse, since she was still at break another one came in and called for an epidural. I had planned on doing it natural and still would have had I known I was already at 10cm when they came to put it in around 12:30. I guess I had the mind set of everyone else, and was thinking I would still need to be there a while and knew I could not take the pain for what I thought would be hours still. Once they checked me and said 10 cm it was a rush to call the doctor and family to tell them it was going to be a little sooner than everyone thought! Thanks to the epidural I was no longer in pain and waiting patiently for the doctor to arrive, luckily my family and best friend arrived just before the doctor on call and were all able to stay and see our little princess arrive! More to come later..........