Katherine Fern Hunter entered this world at 7:19 pm on Saturday, September 21, 2013. She weighed in at exactly 8 lbs. She was 21 inches long and got 8 and 9 for her apgar scores. Her first name is Katherine because we love it, and her middle name is for Brad's grandma. We'll call her Kate.
I can't believe I'm posting this! I never take these shots, let alone post them.
These are both about 1 minute after she was born. She hadn't quite gotten her color yet.
These are the kids' and Grandma Hunter's first visit to the hospital.
It's been a lifesaver to have Brad's mom here!
These are from the kids' second visit and right after church.
Daddy and his newest girl.
This is Kate today - her first day at home. I think she looks a lot like
this picture of James here.
Here's all the details for my own record:
Dr. Scibetta told me that I could be induced when he was on call during my 39th week, which turned out to only be two days early. He promised me that if they told me there was no room when I called in the morning to call him and he'd help me fake labor. :) I called promptly at 6:30 am and they said there may or may not be room for me at 11, so I decided I would not bother Dr. Scibetta until I saw what they said at 11. However, trying to take matters into my own hands, I decided to exercise vigorously to get my own water to break. No such luck.
I came back and got ready for the day, and at 9:30 Dr. Scibetta called me and told me to come on in. I love that he remembered and got me in. He broke my water around 10. I had high hopes that this would send me right into labor like it did with James, but it didn't. After a little bit they let me walk around and that got some mild-ish contractions started, but nothing that strong. Finally around 1:30 they decided to get my epidural in so they could start pitocin. The resident had a little bit of trouble getting my epidural in. She tried 4 times and when she thought she'd got it they ran a test with some epinephrine (adreline) to see if they were in a vein and suddenly my heart started racing. So after that the attending had to do the epidural. It took him a little while as well, but he finally got it in. I felt bad for the resident - she clearly felt pretty dumb, and my nurse made a comment about what a bruise I would have, and then my doctor came in and said, "I hear anethesia was using accupuncture as a form of pain relief on you." It wasn't pleasant at all to go through, but I still felt bad for her.
Things went very smoothly until around 5:30 - right after I sent Brad to get himself some dinner. I started to feel the contractions and the need to push (and to pee). After about 45 minutes of really painful contractions, they got anethesia back to give me more epidural and then had a resident check me. I'd really felt like I might need to push soon, so I had Brad rushing back from dinner, but when the resident checked me, she said I was only at a 6 1/2. However, 45 minutes later Dr. Scibetta came to see if he could get dinner or if we were going to have a baby. When he checked me, he said, "We're going to have a baby right now." Sure enough, 5 minutes later Kate was here. I pushed about 3 times and she was out. He said he could see the head after my first push, the head was out with the next one, and the body was out after that. It was so fast! I couldn't get over how fast it was!
She has light brown hair and fairly bluish eyes (right now). She is a great eater! In the first 4 hours of her life she ate for about 2 of them. She's got super chubby cheeks that I can't help but kiss. And she is getting a LOT of love from her siblings. They came to visit us 3 times at the hospital, and since we've been home they have done almost nothing but hold baby Kate or try to give her toys, blankies, and pacifiers. We really adore this little girl. I just feel like she is supposed to be part of our family.
