Now Presenting... Grady Shaw Perlman

He was a long time coming, but oh-so worth the wait! It wasn't an easy road to get here, nor was it an easy pregnancy. But at 8:13 pm last Thursday night when I heard that high pitched shrill, and heard the doctor say, "It's a Boy!", I knew that all was right in our world.

On Thursday, May 14th, I was scheduled to go in to the hospital for my induction at 7 am. However, when I called at 6 am see if they had a bed available, they were busy with too many active labors, and asked me to call back in a few hours. As I was off all of my medication and had a short window to work with, the hospital (after receiving a stern call from my OB) realized that I needed to be there, quickly called me back and asked me to come in.

When I got to the hospital, I was whisked into a Labor & Delivery room, asked an hours worth of questions, had blood drawn, given an IV, Pitocin to start contractions, and settled into my bed. Unfortunately, all of the OB/Gyn's had gone back to their offices and I had to wait for one to come back in order for one of them to break my water. So I waited... and waited... and waited... while watching TV with Matt and staring at the gorgeous view of the harbor and the Pacific Ocean from my room. Around 12:30 pm, my doctor came to see me, checked my progress, and broke my water. After 3+ hours on Pitocin, I was still only 1 cm dilated, and not showing any signs of moving into active labor.

Three hours later, and now in enough pain to get my epidural, I was checked again and only at 2 cm. Lucky for me, my platelets had a smidgen of benefit from the WinRho infusion and had spiked just enough to get the epidural without needing the transfusion. Thank goodness!

By 6 pm, I was only at 2.5 cm. I was starting to get anxious that we weren't going to see a baby until the next day, so I encouraged Matt to get out of the hospital room and go down the street to his parent's house where he could have dinner with them and the girls. The nurse discouraged him from going, telling him that my body was going to start moving things along, and once it did, it was going to be a quick delivery. It sure didn't seem like anything was quick up until this point.

The nurses had their shift change at 7 pm, when our nurse did one final check and told me that I was between 3.5 - 4 cm and was about in active labor. Now we're getting somewhere.

Less than 45 minutes later our new nurse came back in to check me and shockingly enough, I was now fully dilated and the baby was ready to come out. I was asked to do one push, when the nurse immediately told me to stop and hold on. The doctor was paged, called, and paged again. Within minutes, what seemed like the slowest of days was suddenly moving at lightening speeds and my room was changed over from a labor room to a delivery room.

The doctor walked into the room at 8:08 pm, scrubbed up, put on his gown, his mask, and barely had his gloves on before the nurse had me starting to push. One long push and the the head was out. I was then told to slow down because the baby was coming out too fast. One slow push and the cord, which was wrapped around his hand was quickly unwrapped, and the rest of his body was slowly pulled out. At 8:13 pm, "It's a Boy" was all I heard, followed by the beautiful sounds of a newborn baby. I looked over and Matt was alternating between smiling from ear to ear and wiping away tears. I think I was just in shock that the 38 weeks and 4 days of growing this little munchkin were finally over, and the new stage of our lives was about to begin.

The baby was cleaned up, weighed, measured, checked out, and then passed back to me. I didn't even take the time to inspect him, I just held tight and didn't let go. Matt made the phone calls to the girls, his parents, and mine. We were both choked up when he told everyone he now had a son.

The rest of the night was a whirlwind. They unhooked my epidural, cleaned me up, and brought me a sandwich before moving me over into my post partum room around 10 pm. Once settled in, Matt left the hospital to go home and get a good night's sleep. Thankfully one of us got one.

My stay at the hospital was quick, and fairly uneventful. We had several visitors on Friday including both of our parents, the girls, and my aunt and uncle. What a hoot it was to see the girls faces when they first met their little brother. We left the hospital by lunchtime on Saturday, which was not a minute too soon! While the nurses on the labor and delivery side were fantastic, I could go on a tirade about some of the nurses in the post partum side. I'll refrain as it would only frustrate me.

Now we're home. Adjusting to life with three kids. And boy parts. And sleepless nights. And feedings. And it's awesome. And oh-so worth the wait!

BTW - I returned home to over 175 comments and e-mails... and obviously can't get back to anyone right now. Please consider this my sincerest thank-you to all who sent us great wishes and wonderful notes.

Now come take a peek at our newest addition. Our swan song. Our son...