as promised, all* the gory details

*well, not all

It was a dark and stormy** night, and a full moon had just crested the horizon. **not stormy at all, actually. but it was dark-ish. with the full moon.

At 2 am on June 25 I woke up to a *POPgushhhh* when my water broke. I hung out at home until about 4, then went to the hospital. When we got there I was dilated to a 5 so they hustled me in, got me all set up with drugs and monitors, etc and I think I just went to sleep after that, thanks to the epidural. {if you're just here for the pictures, skip down to the next ***starred section for the much-abbreviated version}

sooo fat. soooo swollen. and sooo sleepy. not my prettiest moment.

I was progressing pretty well up until about 7 am when I stalled. I was dilated to an 8 and stayed there for hours. The nurses (all awesome) broke out the Pitosin to get me laboring and increased it incrementally all day long, but by early evening they had the Pit at maximum dosage and I still wasn't dilated to a 10. When I got to a 9+ they had me push for an hour...with NO progress. The baby would get a little bit closer during the pushing and as soon as I'd relax he'd retreat. Apparently my pelvis is shaped more like a football so the baby was unable to get his head under the pelvic bone. And because he had been in the birth canal for so long his head had gotten really coned so trying to use forceps wasn't an option.
So then I did something called "rest and descend" for an hour and then around 8 pm another hour or so of pushing...still no progress. I'd had a bit of a fever all day and at this point it spiked, so it was time for a C-section. Before I went into labor I was terrified of having a Cesarean but by this point I wasn't feeling fear about getting cut up, I was just totally bummed that I didn't get to do it "the old fashioned way." But C-section was definitely the right thing to do in this situation so while it was a bummer, I'm glad that both Cache and I made it through healthy and happy. Tye watched the surgery and was totally fascinated by it, I think he was reconsidering his career choice.

***So 19 hours after I went into labor, Cache was born at 9:25 pm via C-section.

When Dr. Chalmers (stud) pulled him out, everyone in the operating room broke out in a loud chorus of "Wooooaaaahhhh!" I seriously thought to myself "holy crap! Is it twins?? why is everyone so astonished and why does it feel like they just lifted a 15 pound weight off my spine?" ha ha. Not twins, but he was heavy enough to have been two babies. And his giant conehead was about 2-babies-worth too.

first family photo

proud papa

The next day, Cache went 16 hours without eating, gained a pound and had dry diapers all that day and he wouldn't respond when we would try to wake him. He ended up spending a couple days in the NICU. All the nurses in there were in love with him. They usually get preemies, so to have a big ole 10 pound brute in there was unusual.

first day home from the hospital (6 days old)

Before having a baby I always though I would know if my kid was good looking or ugly. I thought I could be objective. But I'm soooo not. Here are the words I use to describe him: Gorgeous. Perfection. Messiah. (Ok, that last one might be taking it a bit far.) Mostly he still just looks like a generic baby, but I think he is so handsome and Tye and I are both totally smitten.