2013/09/08

Contest Winner....

Jessica Growden won my blog contest. She guessed girl, 7 days late, and weighing in at 8 pound 5 ounces. Her guess of girl and 7 days late was the only guess to achieve 2 out of 3 without missing the sex. Great job, Jess! It will be a couple of weeks before I finish the prize for you. Email your mailing address to me when you're able. Thanks everyone for playing.

2013/09/04

Jemimah Norma Stiles Reynolds

In the fullness of this pregnancy it seemed as though our little package wasn't going to arrive in our preset timeframe. We worked hard to instigate labor. Through laughter, walking, squatting, hiking the stairs 2 steps at a time, chasing kids, hard working around the house, etc., etc. our little bundle wouldn't budge. A scheduled induction found its place on the family calendar. Don't worry, this was after the guessing game was posted.  Jake has to be back to work next week, so in order to have the few days of downtime required for a new mom to recover we decided to give our bundle a week post date. We had to pass a fancy ultrasound test for labor and delivery to permit the pregnancy to go through the long weekend. That test was Friday. As it turns out my fluids were low but all else was perfect with the baby. We spent most of the day Friday deciphering this. So It goes with my post date pregnancy. Drama! Oh yes, then there's the abscessed tooth that reared its painful head Friday morning. Very funny timing to occur on Labor Day weekend. Jake contacted two ERs and two dentists. Nobody takes care of teeth on Labor Day weekend. Ouch. I was less than pleased at the thought of labor and delivery along with an abscessing tooth.

So, we coasted through the weekend. Nothing happened. Go figure. We had many people praying for us and particularly for the baby to arrive before the Tuesday induction. This didn't happen. I spent a couple of evenings crying as I brushed my teeth. Don't pity me. It's called a lack of faith and discontentment with Gods will. I knew it, but man, pity parties are fun when you seemingly have something to cry about.

 I had a rough evening Monday. Jake encouraged me and told me if I was still checked about the induction we could cancel. I woke Tuesday with a peace and calm shaken up with a shot of courage. We called labor and delivery. There was room for us at the inn. We checked in. Got my antibiotics going thanks to my GBS positive result. This turned out being such a blessing. The antibiotics had a two fold effect. They knocked out the risk of our baby being exposed to the positive result and after the third bag my abscess tooth was numb. Just enough to trick my dying nerves. We checked into our huge delivery room. The midwife came in at 7:30. She easily broke my bag of waters and we were now on the clock. She would give us until evening before introducing a chemical. We paced the halls and watched the L&D floor fill up. It filled up so much so that scheduled c-sections and other inductions were turned away. 15 babies were born. We were marveling at The Lords timing of having us arrive that early am. Had we come later we would have also been turned away.

In the early afternoon Jake read our daily lectionary to me and we prayed asking God to let this labor start. I kid you not, while he was praying I had a nice contraction. Not nice as in friendly but as in ouch. It took several minutes and another came. By 2:30 I started getting a bit more regular.. Every 5-8 minutes. By 3:00 we were up to 3-5 minutes. It's fascinating watching ones labor progress. The ebb and flow is much like watching waves roll onto a beach. By 3:15 I was in pain and was so thankful knowing I was going to make the deadline and wouldn't need any chemicals to get my labor going. We had a friend from church bring Jackie. She had asked to see the baby come into life. She arrived at 3:45. By this time things were serious and the midwife was just arriving. Thankfully Jake was there to articulate to the nurse that even though I was only dilated to a 4, the time being 3:30, the rest was going to go fast. He says its something with the way I breathe. He had the nurse check me 5 minutes later and I was to a 6. So, once Jackie arrived I had hit my transition. We told her she could leave the room if she got scared. After all, we want grandchildren.. She wasn't afraid and stood at the head of the bed near Jake. At 4:17 Jemimah arrived. We chuckled in surprise, a girl! I guess deep down we both thought boy. How delightful to be wrong in our instincts. In more ways than one...The induction was amazing... Our midwife was superb.... The antibiotics relieved my tooth... The baby came sweetly and quietly into a huge room bright with the light of day.... Our eldest daughter saw a child enter into life; new and fresh.... I didn't hemorrhage.... We were well looked after and some folks recognized us from 2 years ago.... This made recovery all the sweeter. Yes, an unexpectedly, awesome day despite my fears.

Jemimah weighed in at 8 lbs 14 oz. She's 19 inches long. She has black hair. We are so humbled by our Gods mercies to us. We are rejoicing over His intricate weaving of a new life.. Just for us and just for Him. What a gift. Life.