Abigail had her first check-up today and she's doing great! She's now 7 lbs. and 10 oz. That means she's gained almost two pounds in the last two weeks (seeing as how she dropped a few ounces after we left the hospital). She's a great eater, so I'm not surprised that she's gaining weight.

She's still sleeping really well...meaning most of the time. When she's awake I feed her and she goes back to sleep most of the time. This works out well for me as I get to sleep a lot of the time, too. I'm really enjoying having my brother be my "manny" and help out during the morning hours. It just makes things so much easier to handle.

My Sunday post will take you as far as ½ way through the labor. I ended up waiting until Sunday afternoon to try to go to the hospital. At about 7 am the contractions started getting farther apart and I got discouraged. I decided to go in at about 1 pm, though, since it was the second child and I hadn’t done any pre-check-in at the hospital yet. They had me sit in a room for about an hour while they monitored me. I didn’t like my nurse, she was brusque with short fingers. That’s a bad trait in a labor and delivery nurse since they have to reach all the way up the birth canal every ½ hour to check how far you are dilated and determine what position the baby is in. I was almost relieved when they sent me home. I was starving! I hadn’t eaten much that day, just some toast because I didn’t want to poop on the floor when the baby came out. Well, they sent me home and told me to come back when the contractions were 5 minutes apart and heavy. I was only dilated to a 2 out of 10 and I had a lot farther to go. On the way home we stopped for a Whopper and French fries. That was pure heaven!

I continued to have sporatic contractions all afternoon and evening. It just wasn’t regular and I was getting discouraged. I hoped that Abby would come on Saturday so that Dylan could spend time with us and not have to take too many days off of work. But Saturday came and went, and so did Sunday. I hadn’t slept since Friday night and I was exhausted from the pain and the worry and the no-sleep thing. Then Sunday night around 10-11 pm the contractions started getting more regular and more intense. I sat around watching TV and the clock, timing and counting. It was about 1 am when Dylan said “We might as well go and get set up in our room at the hospital.” I was apprehensive. I didn’t want to get turned away again. It’s incredibly discouraging, embarrassing, and depressing. But I agreed and away we went. My brother had just moved into our basement apartment on Friday night, so we put a baby monitor down there so he could listen for Seamus.

We got to the hospital and got set up and received discouraging news. I was still a 2, even with all of the labor I’d been enduring. They did the whole “watch for an hour to see if you progress” thing, but this time with a very nice nurse named Melissa who was encouraging and enthusiastic. After an hour I was still a 2. Stupid contractions…not doing their job. Melissa called the doctor and asked what she wanted to do. The doctor, coincidentally, was not my regular doc but one of the three in his office. She was the one on call, so she was in charge. The doc said to let me walk around for an hour and try to get things going. I was so relieved that they weren’t sending me home I would have agreed to just about anything.

So we walked around for an hour. By this time it was 2 am and Dylan was incredibly tired. So, I would do a circuit around the halls, and then pick him up at my room and he would walk a circuit with me. Then he’d sit one out. This continued on for an hour with frequent breaks for contractions. It was actually not that bad. The hospital was deserted and it felt good to move around. I just carried around a magazine and read the thing cover to cover while I walked. At the end of the hour I passed the nurse’s station with about 8 nurses sitting around chatting. Melissa told me it was time to check me and I said “Sure, can I go back to my room first?” Everyone laughed. I’m hilarious when I’m in pain.

Miracle of miracles, I was now at 3 cm!!! You’re supposed to dilate one centimeter an hour to be in what they call “active labor”. And they won’t admit you unless you’re in active labor. I was thrilled! Melissa called the doc again and she said to let me walk around for another hour and see if I couldn’t get to 4 cm on my own. I was happy to oblige, even though I could barely put one foot in front of the other anymore. I started a circuit, but by the time I’d completed it I heard Melissa telling the other nurses that she was looking for me and that she’d catch me next time I went by the desk. I walked up and asked if they were looking for me. She said the doc had called back with orders to put me on a pitocin drip (to stimulate contractions and put me into active labor) and get me the drugs if I wanted them.

Hooray!!! At about 4:30 am they put in an IV and started my drip. It immediately put the contractions about 2.5 minutes apart and pretty intense. After about 10 minutes of that I asked for my epidural so I could get some sleep. The Head of the Anesthesiology Department happened to be the on-call guy that night and he came right in to start the epidural. He was super quick, I guess you don’t get to be the head of the department for nothing. Dylan watched and said it looked pretty cool. Not 10 minutes later I was completely out of pain, even though the contractions were getting more intense. This guy was awesome and really cheerful for 4:30 in the morning. There was only one other girl on the floor who was in labor, so I got great attention from the nurses.

After the pain stopped we turned out the lights and got some sleep. At the 6 am shift change they woke me up to check me and told me I was doing great and to get more sleep. At about 7 am I felt something weird come out of my nether regions and called the nurse. It felt like a poop or maybe a baby arm, but I was so numb that I couldn’t tell. I was also on my side and couldn’t move without help. The nurse checked and sure enough it was part of the placenta that had gotten caught on the outside as the baby’s head descended down the birth canal. She marveled that it hadn’t ruptured, it was just a gross water balloon full of amniotic fluid. She ruptured it and said that it wouldn’t be long now. I got Dylan up and he started cleaning up. They had brought in a cot for him to sleep on and he collected all of our things. They called the doc and were told that she’d just been called to Timpanogos Hospital to deliver someone who was further along than me. I had to wait. I waited for about an hour, just kind of hanging out and not pushing until she got to Utah Valley Regional Medical Center.

The doc showed up at about 8 am and said “Oh, goodness, you are really ready. I think this baby is coming in the next 15 minutes. Let’s start pushing.” I told her I wanted to try to do it without an episiotomy (that’s when they cut a little to prevent tearing) and she said we could try. She said to push slow, but I didn’t know quite how to do that since I was numb. I did the best I could and after one good slow push and another half push the head was out and the body pretty much came out right after it. I only tore a tiny bit, just enough for one stitch. Abby was perfect and they cleaned her up quickly and gave her to me. Everyone left the room to go do other things…the doc, the nurses, even Dylan went to call all of our family to let them know the good news. Abby and I were left alone to hang out and it was beautiful. The delivery rooms are on the top floor and we were in the same room that Shay was born in. The nurses call it the Timpanogos room as it has a beautiful view of Mount Timpanogos. The sun was just cresting over the mountains on Labor Day and the room was full of light. I held my little girl, nursed her, sang to her and we totally bonded. I’ve rarely felt so peaceful and close to the Lord in my entire life. I loved it. After awhile the nurses and Dylan came back in to take Abby down to be given a bath and have tests run. They moved me down to my recovery room and I started to recover from the ordeal.

The recovery has gone pretty quickly this time. Within hours I was up and around, and on Tuesday I actually got up to clean up my room and sit in a chair. It was pretty boring in the hospital by myself, so I asked to be discharged at 5 pm on Tuesday instead of having to spend another night in the hospital. Dylan and Shay came and picked us up and brought us home. Shay is thrilled with Abby, he talks and sings to her and gets so excited when she wakes up. She’s been mostly sleeping and eating since she’s gotten home with small periods of wakefulness. I’ve been getting lots of sleep and my body is healing nicely—almost back to normal now with very little pain.

All in all, we’ve been pretty lucky. She’s a beautiful girl and I love having her here in our family. She fits right in and it feels like she’s been here a lot longer than 6 days. We feel so blessed and we’re grateful for all of the love and support we’ve received from my family and from all of you. And that’s the Story of Abigail Jayne.

I don't have a lot of time to post right now, but I wanted everyone to know that the newest member of our family has finally arrived. She was born at 8:36 am on Labor Day, September 3, 2007. See, she already has a sense of humor...being born on Labor Day...how cliche can you get?

For pictures see the Thurston's Gallery

She's a cutie. Welcome, Abby!!

This Labor Day Weekend we had no plans to go out of town and visit anyone so I decided to make the most of it by having a baby.

I spent most of the day Saturday having those pesky "pressure contractions" that weren't associated with any pain. I didn't know quite what to make of them...whether they were real labor pains or not, so I decided not to worry about them. I made the most of my Saturday and thoroughly enjoyed watching BYU's football team wipe the field with Arizona's football team. Go Cougars, 20-7!!!

After the game we had a cookout with yummy hamburgers and corn on the cob. Since the contractions were getting more frequent and a bit heavier I decided to maximize my last meal for awhile. I ate two hamburgers and probably more fresh tomatoes than was good for me. Then I polished off the last of our French Vanilla Ice Cream for dessert. Yum. I spent a relaxing evening watching TV and then we headed off to bed.

It's currently 3am and I've spent the last 3 hours in 10 minute increments watching the clock. My contractions are now 10 minutes apart and getting moderately painful. It's strange to pass the time watching the clock and being able to predict when the next time you're going to feel pain. But there came one just as I was writing, right on the dot. Good old bodies. Heavenly Father sure knew what he was doing when he created them. You don't have to do a thing, your body just knows how to deliver a baby and does it when it's good and ready.

I guess my doc wasn't so far off on the timing anyway. It's amazing that they can predict almost a year in advance when your body is going to do something spectacular, like decide the baby is big enough and go ahead and deliver it. I mean my doc was right almost to the day. Got to love thousands of years of women paving the way for science today.

I think that's it for now. Stay tuned in to see if I was right, or if this was all a big hoax and she decides to wait it out another week. If I had to make an educated guess, though, I'd make Abby's birthday out to be September 2, 2007. Only time will tell...

Well, today is my due date, but there's nothing going on. I've been having fairly regular "pressure contractions" but no dilation or anything. I'm wondering if there are any overdue fines that the doctor has to pay me. After all, he predicted the date, shouldn't he have to compensate me for an overdue baby? The library is charging me $6.50 for overdue books, but the doc gets off scott free. In fact, I have to pay him for an inaccurate date. I don't think this is fair, do you?

I've decided to hire Merry Maids to come in while I'm in the hospital and deep clean my house. Over the last few months I've been letting things slide around the house as I've been getting bigger and bigger. Finally I looked around and realized how badly the house needs to be cleaned. We've been here for a year and the house was empty for a year before that. I cleaned as best I could when we moved in but nothing like professionals could do with their neato scrubby pads and special cleaning solutions. Apparently a lot of women in my ward have been doing this when they have a new kid. Just kind of starting fresh with a sanitary and spotless house/bathroom/kitchen. It's a little expensive, like $250 for a kitchen, three bedrooms, a living room, and three bathrooms, but I think it's going to be totally worth it. They do a lot of cleaning and sanitizing and I just can't do it right now with my big belly and aversion to chemical fumes. I'm actually looking forward to the experience. I'll have to write about how it goes. It's my first time with a professional crew. I usually balk at spending money for something that I can easily do myself, and I'm a little embarrassed about the state of my bathrooms, but that's what they're here for, right?

Anyway, we'll keep the blog posted with any news. Silly Abby, it's your due date! Come on already!!