A birth story

While writing this post Conner is laying like a little bug sleeping on Mark and I can't help but think of the joy he's brought to my life. I look at the picture above and it amazes me that the little guy next to me was inside my stomach at this point...on second thought maybe I can believe it because I was HUGE! While I still haven't been able to forget how difficult pregnancy was, I believe I can understand why some people would want to have more than one child because the whole birth experience was pretty incredible. The picture above was taken just as we were leaving for the hospital at 4 a.m.!! I already hate these pictures of me but they are important for documentation.
I decided to have the baby at the Payson hospital because my Dr. only delivers there and Utah Valley but because Utah Valley won't induce a first time mother until over a week after delivery I opted for Payson. I seriously tried everything sans castor oil to get him to come early but nothing worked. I was stuck at 80% efaced and dialated to a 2 for three weeks. His original due date was June 3 so he was born just one day early.
When we first got to the hospital to check-in at 4:45 A.M. they put me in a room, hooked me up to the monitors, and told me the nurse would be in shortly...well, at 7:30 I finally rang the nurse button to ask where my pitocin and IV was (It's only because of my patient husband that I waited that long to ring the button). They told me that they were swamped with people coming in that were already in labor so they had to make sure those people were all set before they could induce me. I wish they would have told me that 2 hrs earlier! The nurse finally came in at 8:15 and started me on Pitocin to induce labor. This is how labor progressed for me:

• 9:30- increased dose of pitocin
• 10:45- Dr. broke water and increased pitocin
• 12:30- received the epidural and spinal (I know you're probably thinking wow Shan you got an epidural quickly but with the pitocin and water breaking I definitely got my taste of some rough contractions and decided I didn't need to suffer more)
• 2:03- dilated to a 4
• 3:24- dilated to a 5
• 4:08- dilated to a 7
• 5:20- dilated to a 9
• 5:55- saw the head and that he had lots of dark hair
• 6:21- Conner was born
  

I was scared to push the button very often for more epidural medicine because Mark has a friend that has inverse sideburns because the epidural was so strong they had to use forceps to get him out and it permanently scarred the baby. At 5:30 I started to really feel the contractions again and the need to push, I kinda ignored the feeling for a little bit and continued to play phase 10 with my mom and Mark but at 5:45 I finally called the nurse in and told her how I was feeling. She decided to take a look and when she did she kinda let out a shocked expression and said "wow there's the head." So they called the Dr and told him he needed to come to the hospital quick. By the time the Dr got there I was really struggling to hold back on the pushing so when he was set up it only took 2 pushes to get the little guy out.
This was right after he was born and they weighed him. He was 20.5 inches and weighed 8 lbs 4 oz.

Words can't express the love I felt when I first saw this little guy. It's crazy how quickly it comes in an almost overpowering wave. I'm so excited for our little family