We are truly blessed, he is a wonderful little boy, healthy and happy. He shows his love for his mumma and daddy by allowing us hours of sleep at stretches of 3-4 hours at a time at night! What a man!
Our birth story began on Saturday the 26th at around 8:15am when my water broke... we called the Kaiser hotline and were told to make our way to St Joseph's Hospital within the next 2 hours and that they'd be waiting for us. We had aleady packed the car with the major necessities, so we took our time, stayed calm, called family, and took our time driving in the snow down town to the hospital. We arrived at around 10 and after confirming it was my water that broke and that I was in labor, they admitted us and we went on up to Labor & Delivery (known as 'The Baby Place') at around noon. My labor was manageable for the first few hours, and I was determined to go sans epidural... I used the birthing ball, the spa tub and walked and walked and walked, but 10 hours in I was only just entering "transition" at 7cm, and knew I had a long way to go, not to mention, I was not getting any downtime between my contractions, which was really unmanageable for me, and was stressing the baby (his heartrate kept dropping). So at around 7pm I decided to kick my "flexible birth plan" into high gear and get the epidural, and never looked back... what a difference. I think had I not gotten the epidural I would have been far more exhausted and pushing would have been a lot more difficult. Instead, though I could still feel all my contractions, I was not under anywhere's near as much physical stress, so Riley was not as distressed either. I developed a fever at around 10pm and the doctors decided that because my water had broken more than 12 hours prior, that the fever was probably due to a possible uterine infection, so they decided to give me a full dose of antibiotics before allowing me to push. The antibiotics dripped from 11-12 or so and then I was fully dilated by just after midnight, the antibiotics were done, so time to push. I won't lie, I was terrified. I started to cry because I was so scared of childbirth, but once we got going I realized that I could do it, and did do it! 50 minutes after starting, we were delivering. What an unbelievable experience. Riley had the umbilical cord wrapped around him, so he was very unresponsive when he was born, his APGAR score was a 1 initially (SCARY!!!), he was completely purple. Ryan looked terrified but kept me looking at him so I didn't see. However, as soon as Riley was free of the cord, he pinked right up and his scores were 8 and then 9. Phew!!! He was a gorgeous little man right from the womb. Just gorgeous.
Ryan was an UNBELIEVABLE support. He was SO amazing. I couldn't ask for a better more supportive husband and best friend. What a wonderful experience all things considered.
We are truly in love with our little Riley and can't wait to share him with our friends and family.
So, without further ado, introducing Our Riley...
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love,
The Williams FAMILY :)
