Friday, October 23, 2009

Our little Angel has Arrived


By now most of you who read my Blog will know our little Angel, Ella Jean Griffin, arrived on 16th October 2009 at 2.43pm weighing in at 7lb 6oz and measuring 51cm.

Nowhere near the doctors prediction of a 10lb monster. It is safe to say nobody won the bet because everyone was in the 9lb range or above.

Things happen for a reason and the Doc scheduling in a C-Section was a blessing in disguise, read more about why later.

We arrived at the Hospital at 12noon, expecting the surgery to be happening around 3pm only to discover I was first for the Doc that day and was actually going in at 1.30pm. By the time I put my bag in the room they were hustling me to gown up and put on my fancy hat and lay back on the bed to be wheeled down the hallway. No time to freak out.

After the Anesthetist doing his, well some call it "magic", I call it "hell", of putting in the Epidural, then the screens went up and it was all systems go, baby arrival is immanent. Jamie was my rock, although he probably didn't think so at the time, I know he wanted to take away my pain and discomfort. After poking and prodding around what felt to me like my guts were spread all over the room, they produced baby. Holding it up over the curtain I asked what we had, "A Little girl" they announced. I burst into "Happy" tears, got a kiss from Jamie as they whisked our little girl away to check her out.

More poking and prodding, I am guessing to put my bits back in, very uncomfortable, a bit of nausea, some tweaking of the medication to stop the nausea, sucking on some ice. Then they brought back my little girl all wrapped up, she was perfect, cute as can be and not at all ugly and monkey-like as I feared.

Recovery was horrific and if someone had asked me at that moment if I would do it all again they would have got a definite NO. Slowly getting feeling back in my legs, pins and needles, unable to move, all very unpleasant. The nurses mentioned that I had lost a lot of blood during the procedure about 1.5 litres apparently, they kept my epidural in my back for the next few days in case I needed to go back into surgery, they also ordered in blood in case I needed it over the weekend. Thankfully my blood pressure was in the normal range so it was not needed.

They placed baby Ella on me for some quality bonding time and what a magical feeling that is, everyone says it is a special moment but it honestly can not be put into words. When your little bundle of joy is stroking her itty bitty fingers on you bare skin, it is crazy the love and emotions that you feel.

The next day the doctor came for his rounds and discussed how the surgery went, he said it was not what he expected, they had cut an artery when he made his incision which was why the major blood loss and they had to get that under control all the while trying to get the baby out, in they end they had to use forceps to get her out. Also my placenta was attached to the Uterus (something doctors refer to as Placenta Concreta), so had I have delivered naturally they would have had to open me up to remove the placenta so the C-section was a blessing.

At least I only had 1 healing process.


My Stick Family from WiddlyTinks.com

1 comment:

LisaW said...

You just brought a tear to my eye Rach. There is absolutely nothing as joyful as meeting your baby for the first time. She is just absolutely adorable! I can't wait to have another cuddle.