She's here!!

After waiting 40 weeks and 1 day, Elise Tiffany came into this world at 3:47am weighing a healthy 9lbs. 5oz. 21 in long. Whew!

It seems like I was in labor forever, but really, I was in hard labor for only 5 hours!
I had been having BH contractions for weeks, totally inconsistent. A week before she was born, those BH contractions started to get more frequent throughout the day. Matt's family and me were joking that I'd go into labor on Labor Day (seems fitting), but alas, no labor, BUT I was in a lot of pain, more so then lately. I had a feeling I was going to have her with in days.
Tuesday morning I woke up having the strong urge to pee, and it felt like I wet myself, it wasn't until I went to the bathroom that I saw I was starting to lose my mucus plug! I was beyond thrilled! I woke Matt up and told him we were having this baby with in 24 hours.
I got mostly everything ready for the arrival (as much as I could, I was having contractions all throughout the day, I'm grateful Matt did a lot of the work like laundry and taking care of the kids).
It wasn't until 6:20pm that those contractions kicked it up a notch. I started timing them, and sure enough, I was having consistent contractions every 10 min, contractions that got stronger by the hour.
I told Matt it was time to go. We got everything ready and had Matt's sister Melissa come over to watch the kids since everyone in the house was gone!
You know, I had this vision in my head that I'd be screaming bloody murder the whole way to the hospital, and dreaded going since it was 45 min away! On a scale from 1-10 my pain was at a 4-5. I got to the hospital, got checked in and honestly thought I'd be 2-3 cm dilated......wrong! I was 5 cm dilated!! I was shocked to say the least! That's when I knew it wasn't going to be a bad experience after all....I could do this!
I got hooked up to the IV and they brought me to the birthing room (very nice might I add). I had a darn intern as my doctor. I wouldn't mind an intern, if only they knew what they were talking about and doing! He would say something and the nurses would have to correct him. He just wasn't warm and welcoming. When your in labor and want to kill the world, you want someone to understand, especially your doctor. I told him I wanted to wait the pain out and see how long I could last with out an epidural...he gave me a smug look like "I don't know if that's a good option...". Yeah, well, at 7 cm I couldn't take the pain any longer and asked for an epidural (which of course he had a great comment for that one).
From then on, things progressed pretty fast! I was at a 7 for a while but still had this urge to push (you know, that uncontrollable feeling). My cervix wasn't quiet yet open on my right side, so I laid on my right side for a while. I was told by everyone to not push (really...I HATE that), but of course, when you have no control, you do what your body says. I started pushing....at 7 cm.
Because of the pushing I went from a 7 to a 9 pretty fast. It was at that point where I was crying because of the pain and told Matt that this baby was coming now, I could feel her head coming out. The doctor and nurses came to check on me and sure enough, she was crowning. It took only 2 pushes to push her out.


I was completely in shock when she came out. She looked big, but I didn't know she would be 9 lbs! It was then that I had to give myself a pat on the back for pushing out a 9 lb baby with only 2 pushes, and I only tore a tiny bit! It would have been a bigger pat on the back if I would have done it with out any meds ;o) I honestly don't know how women do it without meds....totally respect for you moms out there who did it all natural!

I feel so blessed to have her in my life! My family feels complete.

I also can't forget to mention how wonderful Matt was during this whole process. He helped me any way he could, even having his fingers almost break because of all the pain I was going through. I love that man more and more, every day.