meet emre!

sorry for the delay in posting the big news but this has been an EXHAUSTING week!  i fear i'm not doing the story of his birth justice since my brain isn't working terribly well, but i wanted to get this up while some of the details are still fresh in my head.  more to come.

he was born on friday (january 27th) at 6:08pm.  i didn't sleep at all the night before and finally got out of bed at 4:30am to find it had been snowing all night.  shortly before we left for the hospital (8:30, i believe), i snapped this photo:

the snow didn't stop all day!  we made it safely to the hospital where we were told the labor & delivery room we had reserved (which they assured us would be available anyway) was occupied.  in fact, every room on the maternity floor was occupied, so they put us in an operating theater.  after i changed into a hospital gown (in the cold operating theater), my water broke.  it contained meconium, so my doctor began induction via petocin, to speed things along.

big foot

contractions started coming on strong, and i was incredibly uncomfortable in that cold, sterile room.  i couldn't really walk, being hooked up to an iv, and i was nervous.  while i laid on the operating table we heard the screams of a newborn baby getting closer.  suddenly a nurse came in carrying the baby, and laid him on a table next to my bed.  she started cleaning him up, weighing him, giving him shots and dressing him.  he'd been born not five minutes before via c-section.  while it provided a nice distraction from the pain i was dealing with, ben and i both thought it a bit odd!

8.8 pounds, 20 inches

at one point ben asked me what i wanted emre to be dressed in when he was born, and i think my response was somewhere along the lines of 'i don't care, just pick something!'  after one particularly bad contraction i turned to ben and said 'f*** this, i'm getting the epidural.'  i had thought i'd try without, but considering the circumstances (cold, uncomfortable room, no place to walk, squat, etc.), i decided i needed it.  around 1pm the epirdural started to take effect and we were put in a private room where we'd stay that night.

with his proud/exhausted/ecstatic mom & dad

for the next 3.5 hours ben and i did our best to relax in our room - this was much easier for me now thanks to the epidural - which i probably mentioned 20 times that afternoon i was SO glad i decided to get.  around 4pm my doctor informed me that i was fully dilated and would be brought back to the operating theater to start pushing.  we walked to the theater (hoping it would help him descend a bit more), where i got back onto the operating table and started to push.

surreal!

ben was a fantastic labor coach, remaining calm, feeding me sips of water in between contractions, and occasionally yelling at the nurses (who kept coming in to get supplies from a cabinet - despite my laying there, legs in the air, having the fight of my life!) to get the hell out.  

his favorite one-eyed expression

miraculously, after far more pushes than i was originally promised i'd have to make, 1.5 hours later james emre greeted the world.  it was absolutely incredible, seeing him come out and meeting him for the first time when he was placed on my stomach before being whisked off to be cleaned.  luckily, the nurses used the same table in the theater to clean him up and give him his shots, so we never took our eyes off of him.  they had to pump his stomach (to be sure he didn't swallow any meconium), but otherwise he was perfectly fine.  

sleeping like a champ

as soon as we returned to the room the phone rang, it was the hospital staff asking for the father's first name.  as soon as he was off the phone, ben looked at me, panicked, and told me he had to go - he had just given his father's name for emre's birth certificate!  he was a little excited, to say the least.

going home - roar!

we spent our first night together in our hospital room, happy when our visitors left to have time to soak in our new little babe.  he was quite calm throughout the night - though ben and i were not.  every time he made a peep we both sprung out of bed.  this parenting thing will take some getting used to!

on his first night at home, with his 'dede' - grandpa balkaya

2 days old

napping with daddy

day 3 - grandma's birthday!

loving his swing (we love it more)

day 4 - such a good napper