Baby Makes Four: Baby really DOES make three!

February 10, 2010 - Welcome Baby Boy!

For the sake of preserving the memory of this amazing adventure, I'll attempt to give the "play by play" of the exciting hours leading to the much anticipated arrival of Griffin Gray.

On Tuesday, Feb.9, Chad and I headed to the hospital to check in for the night. We got there around 6:00 pm and were in our room by 6:20. From there, I got in my gown, met the nurse on duty and got settled in for the night. Chad ran out to get us some Maggiano's for dinner. After midnight I couldn't eat anything else so we wanted a yummy supper to hold me over to my next meal.

At 8:00 I was given my Cervadil to help soften the cervix. Once I got that I had to lay down flat for 2 hours and not get up and was told that this might make me feel a little "crampy." After the 2 hours had passed, I got up to go to the bathroom and to stuff my face with some crackers (remember after midnight I couldn't eat again for who knows how long)! While standing up and eating the crackers I started to feel some major CRAMPS! Hmmm...wonder if this is a contraction?...............Yup! It was.........At this point the contractions started coming on full force and pretty close together. OUCH! Contractions hurt.....that's all there is too it.

I let the nurse know that I'm having contractions and ask how soon I can get an epidural! At this point I believe I was 2-3 centimeters dilated. The nurse had to call my midwife to get the okay and thankfully got the okay....about 3 hours later - 1:45ish - I got some sweet relief. I swear, that shot is pure magic.

(If you're wondering what was going on in those 3 hours I was contracting with no meds, here it is in a nutshell.....got an enema, spent some quality time in the bathroom (having contractions on the toilet just plain sucks), emptied my bowels, my water broke (very strange feeling), got in the bed and breathed through the pain. Chad was such trooper during ALL of this and didn't get mad at me when I got mad at him for trying to breathe along with me...LOL!)

Once the epidural kicked in, Chad and I were able to get some sleep! Our sleep was interrupted by nurses about every hour - and about every 20 minutes for me with my blood pressure cuff going off automatically - but the rest that we got was absolutely priceless!

In the morning, let's say 6ish, I was given Potocin to start the labor (what?! hadn't it already started...I just kept my mouth shut though...anything to make it go faster, right?) Apparently my contractions had slowed down a lot through out the night, so they wanted to jump start things again.

I think at this point I was about 5 centimeters dilated. Contractions started picking up again, but I couldn't feel them thanks to the magic shot, and I quickly progressed to 8 centimeters. By the time I made it to 9 cm. the nurse on duty was talking about pushing. She decided to call my midwife to come to the hospital to see if we were ready to go! (Let me add that by this point I could feel my contractions again in full force...the pressure in my back and..........lower.........was terrible. I kept asking any nurse that walked in the room to up my epidural. Turns out the only relief for this pain was to PUSH!)

So, when the midwife got there we tried to push...............too soon.............she'd come back in an hour. Shucks - guess it's better to sit and wait than to tire myself out by pushing before I was ready though.

When Renee (my midwife) came back, it was go time! We started pushing for real - Chad on one leg, some nice nurse on the other. Every time a contraction came we'd do 3 long, hard pushes. Everyone asks how this feels....for me, the pushing didn't hurt. Once Mr. Griffin started coming out is a different story...that hurt. But -I can't complain - I pushed for about 40 minutes and out he came. A BEAUTIFUL, HEALTHY BABY BOY!!!

I hope I never forget what I felt in that moment. I couldn't see what was going on, but seeing it though Chad's tear filled eyes was the coolest, most special moment I can remember to date. The instant love and adoration I saw in Chad quickly snapped me into reality and I started crying too. The moment we'd been waiting for and wondering about for 9 months was finally here.

Welcome to the world Griffin Gray Herring!

Born at 12:34 pm

Weight 7 lbs. 7 oz.

Length 21 in.

After the birth the next few hours and days were filled with visits from friends and family and people who instantly fell in love with our little man. How nice to know he is loved by so many people.