Happy 1 Month Sophia!

 Welcome to the world baby! Sophia Rae Marino born 6/14/12 at 11:57 p.m weighing 8 lbs 1 ounce.

Kangaroo Care: The above photo is what is called Kangaroo Care and it's amazing :) Right after you give birth, they put the baby on your chest with skin to skin contact and then throw warm blankets on top of you. For 1 hour, your precious baby is all yours not even your hubby's (sorry hubs!). No one is else is allowed to hold for one hour so I was able to lay there while the doctor finished up and finally relax while sweet Sophia rested on my chest. It was an unbelievable moment!

No onto labor...terrible, horrible, no good, very bad labor!! Oh it was awful and I give major PROPS to any woman who goes through natural child birth! So here is my story:

I was not dilating and I was about at my due date, I was miserable and my doctor didn't want to go past my due date if she didn't have to because it would make the baby bigger and harder for me. So I was to get induced @ 12am on Wednesday night going into Thursday, June 14th. I was given medicine to help me sleep as I had never slept in a hospital before and I was so anxious! Needless to say, I didn't know I would have to sleep with all of these wires and monitors hooked up to me so I maybe slept 30 minutes that night. I had been dilated a half cm for over a month and so they gave me medicine to soften my cervix...by 9am on the 13th, I had not dilated at all. Then they gave me Potusin (however you spell that...it's the medicine that induces you) and had me on the maximum dosage till about 1:30pm. During that happy, I was a happy camper because it was a waiting game and I couldn't feel the tiny contractions I was having. At 1:30pm, I had only dilated to 1cm. At that point Dan and I had a major decision to make. I was to go home and return a week after my due date to try again or I could have my water broken and if I didn't dilate by 11pm then I was going to have a C-section which I really did not want. After a lot of thought, we decided I had already been through a lot of pain (see picture/explanation below) so let's go for it...time to break my water! Immediately after my water was broken I began to have contractions. But since I didn't have my "cushion" anymore during the early part of my labor, all of my contractions were extremely painful despite the pain medicine they were giving me. Finally about 8:30pm that night (still NO sleep),  I was told I had dilated to 4cm and it was time for my epidural. I screamed out "Hallelujah" as I was happy to soon be out of my pain! The epidural didn't hurt a bit since I was too busy with the pain I was already in! Well well well....after just an hour or so I began to feel the worst pain I have ever felt in my life! I couldn't describe it except to say I felt like my pelvis bone was breaking in half. I began to scream constantly in pain and everyone including Dan thought it was just normal contractions but I knew something was wrong. The remote I had that I could push to give myself extra pain medicine wasn't working. So finally the anesthesiologist came to my rescue! My epidural had fallen out while I was 8cm!! Phewwwww there is no way I could ever do natural childbirth after I got just a taste of it! As soon as the epidural kicked in for real this time, it was Heaven on Earth and I let out a huge breath! Finally for once that day I was not in pain! But I did get nauseous and started throwing up right as I got to 10cm so they gave me some more medicine that also has a side effect of sleepiness. At this point, I was delirious! So much that I had an apparent conversation with my doctor that I completely do not remember! I was only told of it from my doctor and Dan who were all laughing at me, I was 10 cm, ready to push, talking about pineapples and rainbows, and despite her hard work, my doctor couldn't get me to concentrate on pushing. So they were forced to leave the room, turn off all the lights, and let me sleep for 30 minutes or so and then when they came back, they said your 10 cm, it's time to push! Yeehaw I was ready! I had that bad girl out in less then 30 minutes! What a relief it was when I heard the doctor say how she had a head full of hair and to hear her cry for the first time (not so happy about hearing the crying now, haha). We stayed in the hospital for 2 more nights and all was well!!

Parenthood: Now my little princess is 1 month old and what a shock she has been to my life! I've always wanted a little girl and I got her but shewww motherhood is not easy! I was used to my 8-10 hours of sleep and if I got less than that, I literally couldn't function right. Now I get 2 hours here and if I'm lucky 3 hours (since I'm breastfeeding and she hasn't been given a bottle yet) and I am able to do everything I did before on less than half the sleep! Go me! I admit, in the past month, I've probably done my hair and make up less than 10X which if you knew me, I basically did my hair and make up every single day, and I'm probably a bit more grumpy then normal but I know all this will improve! Looking at the big picture, Sophia really is a good baby. She doesn't just cry over anything, if she cries there is something wrong and once it's fixed she is okay, she doesn't throw up a lot, and although we had our meltdowns in the beginning because she wasn't a good latcher, we are all better now and she eats a lot!!  I am very blessed to have her AND my husband who has been incredible at helping me in anything and everything! He basically showered me when I was weak in the hospital and has done anything and everything for me and the baby! I couldn't do it without him!!

Above is why I chose not to leave the hospital and return a week later to restart everything. I loved the hospital and nurses where I gave birth except the first nurse I had. One arm she got my iv stuck in a valve and the other needle blew my vain. Finally after both of those tries she gave up and had a "real" nurse come in who knew what she was doing and put my iv in me in 10 seconds painlessly. But these first 2 tries hurt so bad I was in tears just as much as I was when I was having contractions. I had gone through too much pain already to give up, go home, and then possibly go through that again! I'm blessed and lucky that me and the baby were kept healthy and safe through it all though :)