Zimmerman Family: December 2012

Ava was a champ last night and actually slept at night and in turn I was able to sleep some too. The past couple nights she only slept 2 hours and was up the rest of the night. So I actually feel like I can do more than sit with her and feed her!

At my 38 weeks appt. my dr. said that he didn't want me going past my due date and that he wanted to induce me Christmas night so I would have her on her due date and that if I progressed more he might even want to induce me earlier. Then on Tuesday at my appt. I had progressed enough that he said I could have her on Thursday! I called my mom and told her and luckily she and sister were able to make down here before the blizzard in Nebraska hit.

At 39 weeks before going into the Hospital.

(This might be boring for people but I wanted to write it down so I can remember it) I had to go into the hospital on Wednesday at 2 to do some blood work and then go back in to be induced at 8. Well Wednesday morning I woke up at 4:30 with some pains and I thought it was just nerves so I went back to bed and then woke up again like 20 min later with the same pains. For a while they were semi constant and then stopped after 30 min and then came around randomly throughout the day.

When mom and Jordan arrived at around 6 the pains were getting really close together and hurt a little more. I was convinced that I was making them up in my head and I didn't want to go into the hospital 2 hours early with nothing happening.

We left for the hospital and Spencer decided to take a short cut and it ended up taking us twice as long to get there so we were a little late. Luckily we only live 2 min from the hosptial. Once we got there, they set me up to monitors. I was having contractions 3-5 min apart and they said that they couldn't induce me because I was already in active labor. Which was something that we both preferred would happen, but we didn't want to spend Christmas in the hospital. It was good that we planned for the inducement though otherwise my mom wouldn't have been able to be here!

I was debating if I wanted an epidural and after like 4 hours I gave in. Before hand they gave me some pain killers. Let me tell you, I dont remember any of those 4 hours minus the pain from the contractions. According to Spencer here are some of the things I kept saying:

- I want chicken nuggets with buffalo sauce ( Apparently i said this a lot and the nurses were all talking about it. One nurse helping with the epidural was like "oh you're the one they're all talking about!")
-What if I forget to breathe. (at the beginning I had trouble breathing during contractions so I guess this was a big worry for drugged up me)
-How am I suppose to tell you how much pain I'm in when I can't open my eyes.
-I wouldn't be a fun drunk.

I don't think I'll take another pain killer again.

After I had the epidural I was able to sleep off some of the pain killers and went from a 4 to an 8 in like an hour and a half. They called the dr. and he came in (he wasn't going to arrive until about 6 and when they called him it was about 2) and then got the room prepared for Ava to come. I think he jinxed me since I was stuck at 8 from 2ish until almost 5. They decided to give me medicine to make my contractions stronger and at 6:00 I was a 10 and at 6:30 am exactly she was here!

She weighed 6 lbs 15.8 oz and was 19 inches long. I had to ask again how much she weighed since I was a little shocked. I was expecting her to weigh a lot more (not that I am complaining) since at 37 weeks they said she weighed 6 lbs 14 oz and they told me they were expecting her to be an 8-8 1/2 lb baby if she went the full 40 weeks.

It's still a little weird to think that she's my baby and that she's only 3 days old today.

Here are some things that we've learned about her so far:

-She loves to eat! In the hospital it seemed like all she did was eat. Literally. The second day she slept for 2 hours and then the rest of the day was spent with her eating, giving me a break of maybe 30 min between feedings.
-She can get very angry if she doesn't get fed exactly when she wants to be fed. (She might have gotten that from her Mom)
-She is the only one I know who stretches and yawns for 20 min without waking up.
-She makes the most adorable faces when she sleeps and can go from a happy smiling face to a what are you doing face in 1 second. She is also a very active sleeper always kicking her legs or waving her arms.
-She is very jumpy, and gets startled very easily. Something she also gets from her mom.
-She hates being moved when she's up and likes staying in one position.
-Also I swear when she sleeps her dreams are about eating. I have tried to feed her but she refuses and turns her head away from me but keeps acting like she's eating.