"Price"less Memories: He's Here!

In case the title of this post didn't speak for itself, our baby boy is here. Ryan Parker Price was born on Tuesday, January 3rd, 2012 at 4:09pm central time at Baptist Medical Center East in Montgomery, Alabama. He weighed a whopping 9 pounds, and he was 22 inches long. Big, healthy baby boy. As you can imagine, we've had our hands a bit full since his arrival, so that's why I'm just now (almost two weeks later) getting around to doing this post, but I figure it's better late than never.
Everything associated with my labor and delivery went pretty smoothly overall. First, Jordan and I went to my appointment with Dr. Dupre at 8:30 as per scheduled, since my scheduled induction for that morning fell through. I weighed 138 pounds, meaning I gained a total of 31 pounds during my pregnancy. Not too bad, I reckon. Dupre checked me, and I was 2 centimeters dilated. I was so glad to hear I had actually made a little more progress. Anyway, as he had promised at my appointment the week before, he decided to go ahead and send me across the street to the hospital to be induced even though I wasn't actually scheduled for it. He told me to tell them I was having contractions (he stripped my membranes while I was in his office so I would have some) and showing signs of water leakage. Like a dummy, I said, "I am?!" He told me to smile and nod and go along with it if I wanted to have my baby. Have I mentioned how much I love my doctor? He seriously cracks me up.
So anyway, Jordan and I loaded up in the truck and drove over to the hospital to be admitted for induction. We were taken to my labor and delivery room (room 11) just after 9:30am, and the nurses began hooking me up to an IV and all the monitors to get the "party" started. I got my epidural just after 11am, and just like when I was in labor with Rylee, the right side of my body had a hard time going numb. I had to lay on my side to help the medicine flow into my right side, and finally, it started setting in. The left side of my body was much more numb than the right side of my body the entire time, though. Anyway, just after 1pm, Dr. Dupre came in to check on me and break my water. If I remember correctly, he said I was almost 4 centimeters dilated at that point. By 3:50pm, I was feeling the pressure to push. The nurses called Dr. Dupre, but he was stuck on an important phone call and wasn't able to make it in time to deliver the baby, so the hospital's in-house doctor, Dr. Thomas, had to deliver instead. To be honest, I was really upset when the nurse told me Dupre wouldn't be delivering. I had never heard of Dr. Thomas before, and I just wanted MY doctor to be the one to deliver my baby. However, as soon as Dr. Thomas walked into the room, I felt so at ease. It might sound a bit silly, but he's an older man, and as soon as I saw him, I just felt very reassured that he knew exactly what he was doing, and that I was in good hands. He was wonderful, and I was able to push Ryan out - even as big as he was - with just a few pushes and no assistance other than an episiotomy (when I had Rylee, Dr. Dupre had to give me an episiotomy and use the vacuum to help suck her out because her head kept hitting a spot and getting pushed back in). I was pretty proud of myself, if I may say so. Of course I was quite emotional through the entire experience, especially when the doctor pulled Ryan out and placed him on my chest and I heard him cry for the first time. I tell you what - it's not always pleasant to hear our children cry, but those very first cries of theirs are music to a mommy's ears. After I got to look at him for a minute, the nurses took him over to their little station to clean him up. Finally, they brought him back over to me, and everyone left the room so Jordan and I could have our bonding time with him and I could try to nurse him.
About an hour later, a nurse came in to take Ryan to the nursery to get his first "bath" and have his measurements taken. We were all very anxious to see how much he weighed. We could tell just by holding him that he was bigger than everyone was expecting him to be. He wasn't chunky by any means, but he was very solid. A little while later, my mom and a couple of nurses came back into the room with big smiles on their faces. One of them said, "Guess what..." I said, "What?" and she said, "Well first of all, he's 22 inches long." That alone impressed me. I rarely hear of a newborn being 22 inches long. It didn't totally surprise me, though. He apparently takes after his daddy and big sister. Then she (I think my mom) said, "Now guess how much he weighs." I knew right then that he must have been over 8 pounds. I guessed 8 pounds, 5 ounces. She said, "Keep going." I hesitantly guessed 8 pounds, 7 ounces. Then the main nurse who had been helping me said, "Honey, you just gave birth to a 9-pound baby." I think I just started laughing. I really couldn't believe he was that big. I didn't think it was possible for me to have a baby that big. How on earth did I carry him around as long as I did? No wonder I was hurting so badly by the end of my pregnancy! When the ultrasound tech told me the Thursday before he was born that he only weighed 7 pounds, 10 ounces, I knew there was no way it was correct. I knew he was bigger than that; I just didn't think he was going to be THAT big. All of the doctors and nurses were shocked. They kept asking me how tall I was. I guess it's not often that a woman my size has a 9-pound baby.
When I got over the shock of my linebacker baby, I asked the nurse if I had missed dinner time. I had not had anything to eat or drink (except for a few ice chips during labor) since about 10 o'clock the night before, and by this point it was already pushing 6pm, so I was on the verge of starving. Thankfully, a cafeteria worker brought a dinner tray to me just a few minutes later. I shoveled that hospital cafeteria chicken and dumplings, roll, and brownie down my throat in between phone calls to friends announcing that Ryan was here. It was actually pretty yummy (although at that point, I probably would've eaten just about anything). Shortly afterward, my family (my mom, dad, daddy, brother, sister, brother's girlfriend, and Rylee) decided to head home for the evening. Saying goodbye to Rylee was a bit emotional. She started crying because she didn't want to leave us, and I knew I would miss her during our 48-hour stay in the hospital. It still feels like it was just yesterday that I was there having her. Anyway, we said our goodbyes to everyone, and after a while, a nurse came to move me to a regular hospital room for the remainder of our stay. I was wheeled to room 229, and the nurse helped me get settled in the hospital bed (I had regained feeling on the right side of my body by that time, but the left side of my body was still pretty numb from the epidural). And so began our two nights in the hospital.
Our stay was actually pretty pleasant. The nurses at Baptist East are wonderful and took very good care of me. We also had some friends and family come visit us and meet Ryan. Thursday afternoon finally rolled around, and it was time to be discharged and go home. As soon as we were loaded up in the truck and got on the road, I started crying (just like I did when we were headed home from the hospital with Rylee). I guess it's just a very overwhelming feeling to me to be sent on my way with a brand new baby. It's a bunch of mixed emotions all thrown together at once. When we got home, my mom, dad, and sister were already there with Rylee. My mom was nice enough to have dinner fixed for all of us as well.
We've been home from the hospital for over a week now, and things have been going pretty well overall. Of course Jordan and I are both sleep-deprived, but that's all part of having a newborn baby. I feel like I'm starting to adjust to what it's like to have a baby BOY versus a baby girl (changing diapers can be quite a task; I've learned I have to be VERY quick or I risk getting a "shower"). On Monday, Jordan had to go back to his job at Home Depot, which I was NOT looking forward to. It's pretty intimidating to me to be responsible for a toddler and a newborn baby all by myself - even if they are my own kids. Next week, he has to go back to his job at UPS as well, so that's when the real challenge will begin. I know I have to learn how to do all of this by myself at some point, though.
Since we've been home, we've been blessed to have friends from our church bringing us meals until we get settled in a bit more. So far, people have brought us rotisserie chicken, enchiladas, pizza, baked spaghetti, a chicken-and-rice casserole, and manicotti. It really means a lot to us that other families will take time out of their busy schedules to help take care of us. We have a great church family.
On Tuesday, when Ryan was a week old, our photographer, Mrs. Lynne Richardson, came over to take newborn pictures of him. I was excited and nervous about them at the same time. He ended up doing very well (overall) during them, though, and she got some absolutely precious shots of him. She's still working on editing all of them, but I can't wait to share them in a post soon when she's done. If you're on Facebook, though, you can see some of the pictures she's already edited and uploaded here and here. Aren't they beautiful?
On Wednesday, green puss started coming out of Ryan's right eye. We took him to the doctor and found out he has a clogged tear duct. We have to put eye drops in his eye a few times a day and massage it. The doctor said it's a very common problem, and it can flare up for as long as a year. Hopefully it'll clear up soon, though. That's really the only "issue" we've had... other than that, we have a very healthy baby. He weighed 9 pounds, 3 ounces at the doctor's office, which means he gained 9 ounces since we came home from the hospital. He's a good nurser (when I can actually wake him up to eat).
Yesterday, I packed up all of his newborn clothes. It was pretty much pointless for me to wash, fold, and put them away in his dresser. If I had known he was going to come out of the womb weighing 9 pounds, with arms and legs longer than mine, I would've gone straight to 0-3 month-size clothes from the beginning. Today, we also decided to move him up to size 1 diapers. I feel like we are squeezing his little legs to death trying to get newborn diapers on him. I just can't believe he's already big enough for this stuff. We did NOT have to move Rylee to bigger sizes this fast. We have a big boy on our hands. We still have two unopened packs of newborn-size diapers in his closet, but hopefully we can take them somewhere and exchange them for a bigger size.
Well... I think that about catches us up to life with Ryan so far. Again, I really hate that I'm just now getting around to doing this post, considering the fact he's almost two weeks old already. I just don't have as much free time as I used to (gee... I wonder why...), and when I do, I'm normally trying to catch a nap to make up for the sleep I'm losing during the night while I'm sitting up nursing a baby. I hate that this post is so long and probably all over the place (if you're still reading, I applaud you), but I figured it'd be easier to just go ahead and put everything in one post instead of trying to take the time to write several different posts. I will try to do better about posting updates from here on out, but don't hold me to it. For now, though, here are pictures from our hospital stay and since we've been home. There are quite a few, so just bear with me.