Amanda's Birth

Birth 3
Originally uploaded by JenJeff.

This wiggly little monkey is our beautiful little girl. Two years later her favourite word is SELF SELF! Ahh.. those days are gone.

At home

We were discharged from the hospital in the early evening on Tuesday, June 15th. Since we arrived home Amanda has been doing very well. She is an excellent sleeper, and despite some early challenges, is also feeding very well. She is a very pleasant baby and we've been surprised by how quickly we've adjusted to the new routine (if you can call life with a newborn a routine at all!). We've already made a few trips out to the mall, Doctor etc. and they have been trouble-free so far. Amanda loves to be in the carseat and has slept through most of our outside trips so far.

Amanda's arrival!

Jen was awakened at 3 am on Saturday, June 12th (right on Amanda's due date!) with contractions, although they weren't regular or too painful at that point. By the time Jeff got up at 8 am or so, they were becoming more frequent, and at around 11:30 am they were 4-5 minutes apart and definitely stronger, so we decided to go to the hospital to be checked out. Our timing was perfect, because by the time we got there the contractions were around 3 minutes apart and required a lot more concentration to get through. We were moved into a labour & delivery room, and things progressed very well from there. The nurses were amazed - we went from about 1 cm dilated at 1 pm to 10 cm by 5:30 pm - much faster than a standard first-time delivery.

Unfortunately, although we pushed for over three hours, it became apparent that Amanda was not going to arrive by the standard route. We found out that Jen has a pelvis that is an unusual shape, which makes it very difficult or impossible for a baby to get past the pelvic bones. Finally we made the decision to have a C-section. It took around 30 minutes to prepare for the surgery, and Amanda was finally delivered at 9:35 pm. In the end we had a beautiful, healthy baby and that is by far the most important thing! We are thrilled with our beautiful daughter and have been spending an inordinate amount of time just staring at her as she sleeps. She changes by the day and it's hard to imagine what we did before she came along!