Away in a Manger

On Christmas Eve, Andrew played the quintessential acting role for an infant: baby Jesus. We asked Lynn's brother to video tape the event (video to appear later), though there were apparently some technical difficulties with the new camera. You can see that we all did quite well, especially Andrew (though Lynn didn't tell me we would be leaving in the middle of the offertory). Andrew appeared to enjoy the singing, so we may be able to take him to church often. That would be nice.

The next day (Christmas Day), Andrew showed no excitement at all, even when we opened his stocking for him. I guess it will take a little bit longer before he really understands what the holiday is all about, and maybe a little longer after that before he realizes that it's not really about the presents. This year he received mostly clothes with a few books thrown in. He also managed to buy Mommy (i.e. Lynn) a very nice topaz pendant by stealing Daddy's credit card. I would be mad, but Lynn really liked it.

Staggered Sleeping

I just wanted to update all those thirsty minds out there wondering how things are going with Andrew. Specifically, I'm sure everyone who has had an infant is wondering, "Are you getting any sleep?". The short answer is that we're trying. For no reason other than our personalities, we adopted a staggered sleeping schedule: I stay up until after 11 while Andrew sleeps nearby, and Lynn lets me sleep in a couple hours after she gets up. With this pattern, we only had 2-3 feedings during sleepy time. Then last night we made the cardinal mistake of both going to sleep at the same time. To punish us, seemingly, Andrew woke up at least (yes, at least) once an hour. Neither of us got much sleep. So here I am at 11:06pm with Andrew by my side updating the blog (and doing some other work). For this phenomenon I blame the hospital for keeping him in the NICU where there is never darkness or silence. He simply doesn't know how to sleep in that type of environment. If he weren't so cute, we might be more upset. Instead, we're still just happy to have him.

Feeling Adventurous

Several people have requested that I update this more often, so I'm sitting here late at night doing so. Honestly it feels like we've lived a lifetime in the past week, yet there's not much more to report... or is there? The past two days were most notable in that Andrew had a lot of visitors. Yesterday we had three separate visits from two of Lynn's work friends and her brother Peter. It was quite exhausting for him! Then today we felt adventurous and took Andrew to Pastor Melanie's house for lunch. There were three other babies there under the age of 1, so we arranged their car seats into a convoy. It was cute.

Yeah, even I'm not interested in all that, so here's a video.

The Bean Has Landed

Yesterday we got to take Andrew home after a very long day of waiting for him to have a wet diaper. The hospital was worried that he was dehydrated, so they wouldn't discharge him until he had 2 wet diapers. The first one came around 11am, but after pushing extra formula (our baby can drink from a cup!) and nursing all day he still hadn't had another wet one by 4:30pm. We were starting to worry he wouldn't make it in time to be discharged before the doctor left for the day (i.e. before we would be stuck at the hospital another night), so we decided to mix things up by taking a walk. One step out the door and the indicator stripe on the diaper turned blue (i.e. the diaper was wet!).

But the real fun came last night when Andrew did not manage to sleep more than 2 hours in a row. I tried to change diapers and rock him, but in the end I really didn't have what he wanted. Then today he slept all day, while we were unable to do so. Tonight should be interesting.

The Whole Story

Now that I've had some rest and things have stabilized somewhat, here's the whole story. Honestly, I never understood why anyone would want to know ALL the details of a birth, so here's just the short story:

Lynn went into labor Saturday morning, so we made the call to the hospital and went in around noon. The labor basically stalled at 6 minutes between "birthing waves", so at 6:30pm we went home. Lynn tried to get some sleep since she had been up since 2:30am and because she wanted to be well rested. Yeah, that didn't work. Contractions got more frequent so we went back. We slept at the hospital Saturday night and woke up ready to get things moving again.

Sunday morning the doctor told us that we were too far along to go home but also at a stage that could last several days (he recently had a patient that went 8 days before being induced). So we started the induction. Lynn was amazing. I could see the strength of the contractions on the monitor, and they were pretty extreme, but she was clearly in control the whole time. However, circumstances beyond our control again gave us extreme options: epidural or C-section. The epidural was started soon after.

After 2 hours of rest, Lynn started the pushing. Again, she was phenomenal. I got to be on the receiving end, so I could see the head slowly moving closer. Unfortunately, with Lynn's fever and Bean's racing heart, we had to move faster, so they used a vacuum (it's not as bad as it sounds). In two pushes we had a baby. The doctor handed him to me and said, "What do you have there?", so I got to be the one to declare Bean to be a boy. I quickly handed him over to Lynn, and we gave him his name.

The end of the story is that Andrew was immediately taken to be weighed and measured and everything, then given back to Lynn, and then TAKEN AWAY. That's right, they took our baby to the "Special Care Nursery" (a.k.a. Neonatal Intensive Care Unit) for 48 hours of antibiotics. We can see him as much as we want, but it's still sad having to go through a security procedure just to watch our baby sleeping (or to nurse or anything). We're just trying to take the opportunity to rest up and get ready to take him home Wednesday morning.

Oh yeah, and here's a picture.

Dr. Dad

Andrew Richard Davenport was born at 10:10pm December 7, 2008. He weighed in at 8lbs 3 oz and measured nearly 22 inches. It was a long labor, and I'm tired. And since Bean is in the nursery the next 24 hours at least, I'll have plenty of time tomorrow to update with the whole story. For now, I have to go make sure Lynn is sleeping comfortably. She did a great job!

In labor

Lynn is currently in labor, so not much time. The short story is that contractions started early yesterday morning, but no progress all day or night. Today we're having more success and are on track to have the baby today. More, including pictures, later.

Update from doctor

We went to the doctor tonight for our weekly appointment, and everything is right on track. Lynn has been a little sick for the past couple weeks, including an ear infection, but it seems that all the coughing and sleeplessness haven't been hurting the baby at all. Phew! Now it's just a waiting game.

Blog Day 1: Mission Statement

The intent of this blog is to give friends, family, and other interested parties the latest scoop on our little bundle of joy. Though created to answer the eternal question of "Is there a baby yet?", we hope that it will also chronicle the first few months/years of our baby's life. Then again, that's assuming we're still coherent enough to use a computer.