My Kiwi Baby

My Kiwi Baby

Sorry it has taken so long, six weeks in fact....
but here it goes


baby was due on December 28th. I thought for sure she would be born before then, but here I was on January 1st and still no baby.
Simon was talking to the missionaries that afternoon and had informed me that we would be feeding them the following evening. I told him that it wasn't going to work for me as I was going to have this baby that day. ( I was trying positive thinking, since I had tried everything else, except jumping on the trampoline, and even that was starting to look like something to try) He just laughed at me.

Later that evening we were watching "Harry Potter and Philosophers Stone" and had been having lots of contractions. not really strong ones, just enough to be annoying. The kids all went to bed and Simon and I stayed up watching "The Green Mile". Now I was still having contractions and I was timing them. The funny thing was that morning I was cleaning out a drawer and I had found Joshua's stop watch that I had taken away from him sometime last year. So my husband just kept on listening to the stop watch beeping alot like every 5 to 7 minutes. They still weren't strong, just consistent. I finally text my midwife about 12:30 and she called me and we decided that maybe I better come in to the hospital. We then called Nanny and Papa J to come and watch the kids. So we waited for them to get to the house.

At the hospital they did the readings, and yes they were still 5-7 minutes apart, but I really had not dilated at all. my body was doing nothing. so about 1am I was given the choice of either going home and they would give my an oral pain killer or I could get a shot in the thigh with another pain killer that would relax my body, but I would have to stay in the hospital for the night. I was going to just do the oral and go home, but then I didn't want to just have to come back, if labor really did start. So I got the shot after 2am. My midwife went home and Simon went to sleep on the floor. Now this medicine did relax my body, enough that I got to sleep, but it wasn't restful. about 3am I kept on getting the urge that I needed to go to the bathroom, but nothing was happening, and my contractions were really starting to hurt. Now I was planning on getting an epidural. So when I finally paged the nurse to come in, and she checked my, I was already at a 7 , so when I asked when was I getting my epidural I was told it was to late (apparently in New Zealand they have meetings before they give the epidural). Now baby was also posterior, so the nurse had me lean over the back of the bed to try to get her to flip, and I needed to have an IV for antibiotics since I was strep B positive, so in the process of getting that in the back of the hand, I was bled all over the bed. By 5:30 I was at full dilation, at 5:35 my water broke. And baby arrived at 5:42am.

and I was still leaning over the back of the bed, so I was on my hands and knees when she came out. I never screamed out I just leaned into the mattress whenever I had a contraction. and Simon rubbed my back the whole time. Baby did flip over, but it was already to late to change my position. I just remember through the whole delivery that I kept on telling myself that it wan't that bad and I could do it. It hurt, and when baby was crowning I just remember a burning sensation.  Simon got to cut the cord. and baby was nice and healthy.

She weighed 8lbs 13oz. and 20in long. With lots of dark hair.
We named her 
Lydia - from the "Work and the Glory"
J- after all my family
Margaret- after Simon's sister and his nanna

and she is such a delight, in fact she started smiling the day after she was born, and she is still a really smiley baby.