Time goes by so, so fast. In a blink of an eye, I’m no longer pregnant, and the baby in my arms is now 1 month old. For most, third trimester of pregnancy feels like an eternity where they’re constantly at war trying to evict their baby. For me, the third trimester really flew by. This was probably aided with the fact that I was induced towards the end of 37 weeks due to gestational hypertension.
Her birth happened really fast and was relatively straightforward, despite being a planned induction. I will spare you the graphic details, but all in all, from checking into the hospital to baby in arms was under 24 hours, which I think is pretty good since the nurse first told me it could take up to 6 days! I ended up getting 3 cytotec pills for cervical ripening before getting the pitocin drip. Once the pitocin started, I had my water broken, and the contractions came on very strong. Originally, I had planned for an unmedicated birth. But as I had been previously warned, pitocin contractions were something else! I was begging for an epidural an hour into the contractions. As it turns out, I got it just at the nick of time, because right after I got the epidural, I was 30 minutes away from pushing and delivery. The actual pushing part took under 40 minutes, which I’ve been told is really good for a first time mom.
The fun fact about Laurelin’s birth story is that we had tried to postpone the induction due to some scheduling conflict with Ian. The week of the induction was a super busy time for him. He had a virtual conference that he was presenting at, he was wrapping up work before paternity leave, he was conducting interviews for his lab technician, and he was a groomsman at his college friend’s wedding that weekend. After several failed attempts to postpone the induction, we just rolled the dice and hoped that it wouldn’t interfere with too much of his schedule. As it turns out, September is a really popular month for babies to be born. So we actually didn’t even get into the hospital until almost a day after our original scheduled induction time. We checked into the hospital on September 9th, and the entire time I just knew we were going to have a baby on the 10th. September 10th holds a special place in our hearts because it’s our wedding anniversary. And we have a running joke that we always spend it in the hospital. On our first anniversary, Ian went to the ER because he contracted a case of viral vertigo. On our second anniversary, our dog Chewie had a bad case of the stomach flu and we went to the animal hospital. On our third anniversary, I thought I was doomed to go to the hospital, so I booked a trip to Europe for the two of us, so we skipped a majority of our anniversary and spent it in the sky. On our fourth anniversary, Covid had ravaged the country, and so we actually managed to avoid the hospital and hid from everyone. On our fifth anniversary, Laurelin was born. (If you were wondering, most of his plans were thwarted. But he did manage to sneak away for a few hours to attend the wedding!)
Everyone says that the first month with a baby is the hardest. I have nothing to compare this to, but if it’s upwards from here, I think we’re in a good place! I’m not saying that it hasn’t been challenging. Getting <6 hours of sleep broken up in 1.5 hour chunks gets old real fast. But sleep deprivation aside, we’re doing really well. She’s a pretty even-tempered baby, she doesn’t cry a lot, is really inquisitive towards her surroundings, and loves to stare at our ceiling fan.
We took her out for the first time (besides pediatrician appointments) for a stroll around the neighborhood and it felt so nice. I’m just really excited to have a mini-me who will hopefully inherit my love of music, baking, and DIY.
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