Declan Christopher Wright

I'm sure this is the post a lot of you have been waiting for- I dropped off there for a bit. Ironically, I had been working on a post on Dec 14th (that I'll post a little later after this one) about what's been going on. Well, Friday (the 14th) I decided that I needed to go for a mall walk or walk around Target for a while. Chris, being very aware of what that could do to help with labor, asked that I find someone to go with me. No such luck so Chris let me go while he was in his last meeting of the week, knowing we have a friend who lives just behind Target that I could call if anything were to start. Well, things slowly started. I had to sit a few times during my 1 1/2 hr walk around the store. Contractions were getting somewhat regular but nothing too close or consistent. We all went to bed not knowing what was going to happen next. Penny squeaked around midnight and went back to sleep. Well, I was not going back to sleep. I got this feeling inside that I needed to start timing my contractions again. I timed them for an hour and they were pretty regular and I knew that this was probably it. As I leaned over to tell Chris, I just hoped in my mind that this was not a false alarm and was thinking of who to call to watch Penny. We had had a few offers from people from Church to watch her but we felt that there was one family that we could really call at 1:30 in the morning. I called them and they were more than happy to take her (although she wasn't too happy to be taken out of her warm bed). As we dropped her off, I kept telling my friend that I really hoped this was not a false alarm and that I was really sorry if it was. As we walked back to the car, the contractions were getting a little more intense. We jumped on the freeway and soon discovered that one of the freeways to the hospital was closed at night for construction so I was happy to know different ways to get to the hospital. We got to the hospital at 2:30a and they got me in a room. We hadn't called anyone in case they were going to send us home. Well, the nurse checked me and I was at 5cm. Thank goodness because it was starting to hurt something bad. At that point, they said they were admitting me and would I like some pain killers (uh, YES. PLEASE. NOW!). We called my parents to let them know that I was being admitted but you never know how long getting a baby out is going to take. It took the anesthesiologist a little while to get to me because he was with someone else. So, I got some intermediate pain killers. The nurse felt around my belly and noticed that Declan was turned on his side and wanted to get him in position. I was then told to lay on my left side to see if that would make him move and they'd check again in an hour. Well, I was given my wonderful epidural before I laid down on my side. After an hour, they felt my belly again and Declan was where he was supposed to be! Now, my water hadn't been broken yet and I was told that only the doctor could do that. Needless to say, when the doctor arrived I was dilated to 10 and was ready to go except for the small fact that my water needed to be broken. Once the doctor broke my water, it only took 4 contractions to push that little guy out (about 20 minutes). From when i arrived to when he came out was only 6 hours and 10 minutes. Declan Christopher Wright arrived at 8:40a weighing 8 pounds 5 ounces, 20 inches long. Thank goodness he was 2 weeks early (by the doctor's due date, only 1 week from my calculated due date) or else he would've been 9+ pounds.

His lowest weight after birth was 7lbs 9oz (just 3 days after birth) and has since gained 2 pounds (weighing in this past Friday at 9lbs 9oz). Declan has been a good baby and has had no problems with nursing. This week, he has started sleeping for a 6 hour run (from 8/9p until 2a). He's been co-sleeping until now because he really likes being held. Penny was such the opposite. We are hoping to move him to the crib in Penny's room by this weekend.

Well, my next post will be about life with two.