We are thrilled to announce the safe arrival of our newest baby, Nathan Michael.
He was due on August 30th, so we were inundated with “have you had the baby” questions and trying to manage life with older children while waiting. Each day was a little bit of a challenge since the kids were not easily occupied by being sent outside and not quite self directed playing inside but we couldn’t really plan activities since they could be canceled at any moment.
A good friend likened it to being inside of a garbage compactor – with the increasing discomfort of late pregnancy on one side and impending labor and delivery on the other.
Finally I decided to just stay pregnant forever. I went to a mom’s night out for our home school group and stepped into the hallway to take a phone call when my water broke – a completely new experience for me. My friend Nella (who is a doula) recognized my completely unnerved state and drove me home with our friend Laura (also a doula).
Labor can take a while to start after your water breaks, so I went home and freaked out. I had no interest in being in labor or giving birth. My husband wanted the midwives to go ahead and come but I’m never really ready to call in the cavalry until I’m about an hour away from delivery. So we compromised on my contractions being 10 minutes apart before they came. In all fairness, he was traumatized by catching our son Eli.
In any case, they were 11 minutes apart from 11 pm to 12 am so he went ahead and called.
Around 1 am we called my lovely massage therapist, Jenn who was better than an epidural.
I labored with Jenn’s help for some time. Then at some point after 2 the contractions got pushy, then excruciating. It was my best experience with labor pain (thanks Jenn!) and my most painful experience pushing (which is saying a lot!).
Nathan was born without any complications at 3:07 am on September 4th. Per my family’s genetic curse, he weighed in at at “healthy” 10 lbs 3 oz. My midwives Meg and Martha were amazing as always and took world class care of us all.
Now we’re just on the recovery side of things which is a little bit torturous for me. I’m not a sit around kind of person and am eager for my body to be well enough to get back into the swing of things – especially a slew of fall sessions I’m excited about. I’m also planning to take some “real” newborn pictures of Nathan soon. Maybe once I can make it through the day without napping or crying.
In the mean time, here are a few meet the baby images from the morning of his birth.
