Brandon Shows Up, Shortly Followed by William

Brandon did, in fact, make it out of Dushanbe on Monday, although nine hours later than the flight was supposed to leave, at three in the afternoon instead of six in the morning.  So in total his flight was delayed by two days and nine hours.  He arrived in Istanbul around six or seven in the evening.  As his flight for Frankfurt didn't leave until 11:15 the next day, he found a quiet spot and got a full nights' sleep.  The next day, Tuesday, he flew through Frankfurt and made it to DC by eight in the evening where his last flight was, of course, delayed.  But this time it was only an hour.

He finally landed at 12:15 in the morning Wednesday, having spent forty-three hours traveling.

After getting to bed around 1:30 Wednesday morning, we spent Wednesday running errands, taking the children to swim lessons and the girls to an activity at church that evening.  As my induction was elective, it was scheduled for the evening.  We were told to expect a call from labor and delivery after shift change, which was around seven.  My phone rang around ten (after a false alarm which was Brandon's bag arriving because, of course, it had been lost) and Brandon and I left for the hospital to finally get the show started.

We checked in around eleven and spent the usual two hours getting settled, IV started, information filled out, and baby monitoring.  My pitocin drip got started at one and we settled down to wait.  I always enjoy the waiting part, the expectant calm, waiting for the baby to show up.  Brandon napped (not having had a full night's sleep since Sunday) and I read and napped.

At three I asked for my epidural (according to my Mom, natural childbirth is delivering without makeup) and it was started about forty-five minutes later.  I had had some problem with low blood pressure while I was in labor with Eleanor, and ran into trouble again this time.  My blood pressure never got above 90/60 for the rest of the labor and the nurses gave me dose after dose of medicine followed by bolus after bolus of IV fluid.

The doctor was finally able to break my water around five (William had been too high before then) and, just as with previous labors, his heartbeat dropped.  Oxygen and a pause in pitocin helped him get back to normal and shortly after he was stabilized, around eight fifteen, I was ready to push.

Ten minutes of pushing and William obliged me by coming out in the fashion that sixth children are supposed to come out - without any trouble.  He was a nice, average weight of seven pounds nine ounces, falling in the same six-ounce range that everyone but Eleanor has fallen in to.  After starting off with some healthy screaming, he calmed down pretty quickly and consented to being adored by everyone around him, especially his siblings when they visited later in the day.

We are grateful to have William join our family and grateful that he arrived without any trouble or problems (and even after Brandon arrived in the US).  I still can't quite believe that I have six beautiful children.  I never, as a child and young adult, imagined that I would be one of those people who have a crazy big family.  Too loud, too busy, too much work, I thought.  Not something I am interested in.  But now that I am one of those people (and yes it often is loud, busy, and a lot of work) I wouldn't have it any other way.  Because even though all of those children have taken over my life and made it something other than I had planned, they have made it better than I could have ever planned.

Welcome, William!  We're happy to have you here!