I can't believe it's been almost(only?) 2 weeks since Kai joined our lives! It's take me a while to resurface on email and blogging, but hopefully we'll find time to get photos and messages out to you all. Here is a new photo of our family, one of many to come
Here is Kai's Birth Story. . .
My water broke shortly after 1am on Monday morning. I wasn't really having strong contractions, but as I was Strep B positive and needed to get some antibiotics into my system, we got showered and made our way to the hospital. My mom and sister has left San Diego to return to Arizona at 1pm on Sunday, only to have to turn around and drive back only 7 hours later. Kai's funny sense of humor was already showing itself.
Becky, our doula, joined us at the hospital around 2:30a.m. and we started working through some contractions. Brendt and I had been preparing for the childbirth using a meditation technique called Hypnobabies. The goal of Hypnobabies is to prepare all involved in the birth with positive birth images and help manage pain through meditation, visualization and breathing. When the contractions started coming, I focused inward and started to use the meditation CDs to get through each wave.
Mom and Katie arrived at the hospital at about 6am and Devrah arrived at 9am.
I made it to about 6 cm. dilated by 9am, using the meditation tracks that we had prepared with, but when it came time to go into transition, the meditation tracks just didn't serve me in the moment that I needed it. I tossed my iPod aside and Becky and Brendt started to coach me through each contraction. Kai's head was very low (-3) so I really had the urge to push. The nurse sent in the doctor to check me and he said that he would come back again to check me in an hour. At that moment I started feeling pretty exhausted and didn't feel like I could get to the end without an epidural. After some talking with Brendt and Becky we decided to push through the next 1/2 hour and see how far it got me. Becky provided me the verbal focus I needed while Katie rubbed my back and Brendt helped me to focus my breathing. It really was a team effort. I had two great nurses, both named Tara, that were very encouraging. When Tara checked me again I had dilated to 9 cm. At that point I knew that I could make it through to the end. I stood up and said, "Ok, lets do this,". We got through the last cm in about a 1/2 an hour and then it came time to push. Because of Kai's low position, I only had to push for 20 minutes. Judging from the sore throat I had later that day, I must have really been screaming, but after 9 hours of labor, our child born at 6 lbs. 3 oz. measuring 18.5 inches. We had been waiting to find out the gender, so Brendt said, almost in a whisper, "It's a boy,". After about an hour of bonding time with our son, we decided to name him Kai Victor Gideon. Kai was a name I read in "Eat, Pray, Love" and we later came to find out that it means Ocean in Hawaiian, Keeper of the Keys/Earth in Welch and Scandinavian, and Unbreakable in Burmese. Victor is my dad's name.
We stayed in the hospital for two days, though neither Kai or I really had any pain or complications. It was more a precautionary measure per the pediatrician to assure that Kai wasn't affected by the Strep B. Thankfully Kai has been a great eater and is already packing on the O-Zs. He was back up to his birth weight a week after he was born and is already up 4 oz. at 9 days old!
We're getting to know Kai, his beautiful face and sweet eyes. He has been keeping us up every few hours or so, through the night, but we're getting into a groove and we'll all be getting more sleep soon. Brendt goes back to work on Monday for 5 weeks before summer vacation. I have 3 months off, so we're looking forward to having June and July to spend together.
