Finally he's here!

Garrett Michael Gragg made his appearance at 2:04 p.m. on Wednesday, March 25! It was not an easy labor! My water broke Tuesday night at 10:45 p.m. just as I was getting to sleep! We came to the hospital only to be told my water hadn't broken and to be sent home! (My husband and my mom are not happy about this still)! As soon as we began to pull out of the parking lot, my contractions began! My husband wanted to turn around and come back to the hospital, but I said no, I'm not going back to be sent home again! So, we got home and I continued to have contractions every 5 minutes for 2 hours before I finally let my husband call the hospital again. They asked if I'd taken tylenol (yes), had I tried to rest (yes), and then they asked to talk to me. The nurse asked if it was like menstraul cramps..duh! YES! Well, it was my decision if I wanted to try a warm shower or come back to the hospital! I still did not want to go to the hospital only to be told to go home, so I tried a shower..didn't work! We headed back to the hospital and got back to hospital at about 4:30 a.m. When they checked me, I had dilated 1 to 2 cm and was 50% effaced! From that point, I was admitted and my family was called to come back. When the doctor came to check I was 3 cm dilated and in severe pain! I asked when I could have an epidural and she said now since I was progressing! Let me just say...that was the best thing ever! By the time they got here I was 4 cm dilated. It went quickly from there and by 12:30 pm I was ready to push, but my epideral had worn off and I was in pain! It was horrible! When I started pushing, we found out he was face up instead of face down and while he could still come out naturally it was going to make it harder! After pushing for about an hour, they decided to try the forceps. They put them in and I said take them out! She did after only 2 minutes and we went in for a c-section! I had to wait again for the epideral guy to come and I was in so much pain that I threw up at least 4 times! Finally they came and I was wheeled into surgery! From this point on, the day is kind of hazy. Garrett came and they showed him to me for about 10 seconds and took him! I had been running a fever since before I started to push and was on an antibiotic, so when he was born, he was running a fever of 102. They took him to the NICU after cleaning him up and showing my family. He was put on an antibiotic as well! His fever broke about 4:30 pm, but because he had an IV to take his antibiotic for precautionary purposes, he had to stay in the nursery and could not come to the room! I finally got to see him at about 8:30 that night, but didn't get to hold him to the next day! He stayed in the nursery until Friday at 11 a.m. and then he got to come to our room and stay! We go home tomorrow after his circumcision and I can't wait!

I am thankful he came when he did because my parents got to be here for it! We are so blessed to have family and friends who have prayed for us, came to see us, sent e-mails, called, texted, and facebooked us! This is a special time in our lives that I know we will never forget and at the end of the day, no matter how bad labor was, I received the best gift in the world....Garrett!