We're Home!

Well the entire McCarthy crew is under one roof now. We are so excited to have Ethan at home with us and Chase. It has been so amazing!

I know some of you want to know the story, so here goes:

Shane and I spent most of the weekend in Baton Rouge for a wedding Shane was standing in. Lucky for us, it was an early wedding and we were back home for 6:00ish. We left the reception a little early because I was not feeling well at all and needed to relax...little did I know that I was in labor. I had been having some labor pains since Thursday night, but as soon as I would lay down to go to bed for the evening, the labor would stop.

Saturday evening around 9:30, I was blogging on the computer when all the sudden I felt a gush of water. I told Shane I wasn't sure if I had peed on myself or if some of my water broke...I was very confused! I called the on call doctor and she told me that I needed to go the hospital just in case in order to prevent infection. As I was explaining to Shane what the doctor said and that we needed to head out, a massive gush of water fell onto the floor. Shane said, "You're definitely not peeing on yourself, it's time to go!"

We packed our bags and my mom headed over to stay with Chase. Once we got to the hospital, we found out that only the first layer of my bag of water broke, but I was having contractions every 3-4 minutes and I went ahead and got my epidural. However, once I got my epidural and was laying down in bed, my contractions started getting slower and farther apart. They were like this for most of the night (every 6-10 min apart). At 2:00 am, I was 4 cm dilated.

My blood pressure kept dropping and the baby's heart rate was very low. I was extremely nauseous and had to try different positions to get the baby's heart rate back up. By 4:00 am, the baby's heart rate was doing great and I was eager. My doctor was not on call, but still said she would come and deliver the baby in the morning. If my contractions were still far apart, to go ahead and start the pitocin in the morning to get things moving.

When the nurse came in and started the pitocin, she decided to check me just to see how far along I was. When she checked me, she broke the rest of my bag of water and was shocked to see that I was already 9 cm. They took me off the pitocin and called my doctor immediately. I was pushing by 8:00 am and little Ethan was here at 8:32 am (with the help of some forceps and an episiotomy because Ethan was head up instead of head down and that would explain all the back labor I was having)!

That's the gist of our little Ethan's birth story and I will have tons of pics to post in the coming weeks. Our little man already has so many nicknames: Little E, EJ, Mister Man, Baby E, etc...

Chase came and visited us in the hospital on Sunday and wanted nothing to do with the baby. He wouldn't even acknowledge him. Last night Chase wasn't too impressed again. But this morning, Chase did so well with Ethan and kept asking questions and wanted to help mommy with him. He even gave Ethan lots of kisses....it just made my day! Soon to be best of friends!