At 2 am, Bug woke up in a coughing fit. It was pretty miserable and took about 30 minutes to get him comfortable and back to sleep. I got up at 2:30 for a potty break and was *thisclose* to being asleep again at 3 am...when my water broke. Bug woke up again pretty much immediately, and I woke up Richard while I tried to get the boy back to sleep. I thought we'd have a relaxed time moving towards having a baby, but Richard flew out of the room to wake up my mom and they tried to rush me out of bed and to the hospital. I paused long enough to get Bug back to bed, then Richard and I took off to the hospital.
I will admit to being pretty freaked out. We were at 35w1d and I worried that the baby wasn't ready. Given the way Bug's birth worked out, I was pretty freaked out about having the baby in a hospital (we'd planned on a birth center birth with a midwife in Houston). And, while I'd had a consultation with an OB that I liked once we got to Arizona, we'd only met the once...and she was out of town when I went into labor, so I had no idea what I was walking into.
As it turned out, I couldn't have hoped for a better birth experience. It was AMAZING. Richard was fantastic. My sister stepped in to serve as my doula, and she was awesome. We had a fantastic, naturally-minded nurse and an absolutely wonderful, supportive OB. About eight hours after my water broke, Boo was born. (Drug-free! Woo!)
She looked pretty amazing, especially considering how early she was born. (The stats: 6lbs5oz, 19.7" long.) Then they realized that she wasn't breathing quite properly. Her lungs were immature and had a LOT of liquid in them, still. She had to go to NICU.
The next time I saw her, she was hooked up to all sorts of stuff...and it seemed they'd added more every time I walked into the NICU.
Boo was able to come off of oxygen pretty quickly, but still needed CPAP for several days. Then her left lung started to vent into her chest cavity, pushing her left lung into her heart and right lung, so they had to put a tube into her side. Scary.
Luckily, Boo is strong and a fighter and things started turning around pretty quickly. After six (long!) days in the NICU, Boo was off of the CPAP, the tube had been removed, she was nursing and they took out her IV.
We're adjusting now to life at home, but she's doing very, very well. And Bug is starting to get used to her. :) Richard and I couldn't be happier. :)
