Phinneas [middle initial tbd] Barber is glad to be home!

Hi everyone, and thanks to special guest blogger Andrew for keeping things up to date while we were in the hospital (and now that we're home, am sleeping a lot). I thought I'd post a few more details about the past few days for those of you who are interested... if not, stay tuned for more interesting stuff to be posted this week!

When we left for the midwife on Thursday, Andrew said we should bring our bags for the hospital "just in case." I thought that was a little overcautious as we'd probably be home eating lunch in a couple of hours, but as it turns out, he was right! At the appointment, the non-stress test looked fine but my fluid was getting low so as you may know, the midwife sent me to the hospital immediately ... the entire time I was thinking, this is nuts. I'm on my way to the hospital NOW? To have this baby? For real? Despite the fact that several wise friends told me to eat up before being admitted, I failed to do so and therefore ended up going into labor having eaten only a bowl of cereal that day. And no coffee! Ha.

Anyway, we arrived at Yale NH around 11:30 and they started me on the pit drip immediately, and my contractions started about an hour later. And after about three hours of horrible painful suffering during which I seriously thought that passing out or death was imminent, I was begging for an epidural, which I swear to god saved my life. (I have a new awe for those of you who have done this naturally. Awe.) The next 5 or so hours were fairly calm as the drugs kicked in, and then a little after 9 PM, I started pushing. We really thought he was going to be an 8/8/08 baby but at 11:30 on 8/7 I was like, PLEASE DON'T BE AN 8/8 BABY. PLEASE COME NOW. And he complied, arriving at 11:39 that night. I have to give so many kudos to Andrew and Mary Ellen for helping me through it, as well as my midwife Amanda and the Yale NH nurses, who were all wonderful. All in all, it was the most painful 12 hours of my life, but this beautiful baby boy is worth it all and then some.

So anyway. We were taken upstairs after an hour of recovery and put into a shared room because the maternity unit was FULL!! I was so mad, even in my sedated post-labor state, as we had been promised a private room - there were just a lot of babies being born on 8/7/08. That night was anything but restful as Andrew was stuck sleeping in a reclining chair that he had to un-recline every time a nurse came into the room (every 20 minutes or so). The couple that we were sharing with were really nice - not to mention the parents of a 9 lb 10 oz baby! - but still, it was a drag. Around 3 pm on Friday they moved us to a private room for the remaining 21 HOURS of our stay. When it was all said and done, I was in the hospital for about 48.5 hours, from start to finish. Such a short time, but we were actually ready to leave.

It was great to get home and settled in on Saturday afternoon, although Finn is still getting used to the idea of sleeping at night (he's more of a night owl so far ... we're working on that) but he's eating great and looking cuter every day. We are having so much fun and will continue to post photos and videos in the coming weeks.

Thanks to everyone for the wonderful phone calls and emails we've received in the past few days. By the way, Finn's full name is still tbd but we are supposed to decide by tomorrow so that his birth certificate can be issued. Dad said just to make sure and not give him a middle name that starts with "U" as to avoid the monogram PUB, but that actually may be kinda cool! Phinneas Urbino? Phinneas Ulysses? Hmm. Maybe not.