She's finally here...

We welcomed Kara Paige Kerth into the world on 10/13 at 10:20 am. She weighed 8 lbs 5 oz and was 20 inches long.

My labor started on Sunday but really started to intensify around 5pm. We ate dinner and put Jordana to bed and called my father-in-law to come over. By 1 AM I was admitted to the hospital. I quickly got my fluids and my epidural. Of course my doctor was on vacation, so the covering doc came in around 6am to check things out. He had am surgery and they started pitocin after he finished since my contractions seemed to slow down. Once the pitocin started, we were moving!! I pushed for about 10 or 15 minutes and there she was!! Since they had stopped my epidural so I could push, I actually felt her being born (and because she was so big). With Jordana, I guess I was too numb or she was too small. It was a strange feeling. I was so tired. When I got to my own room I slept for about an hour and was woken up by the worst contraction I had ever felt. Since I didn't have my epidural, and I didn't know that I was still getting pitocin....I was pissed. I called the nurse for some pain pills. I really didn't want them because they make me sick and I had alredy thrown up once from the epidural. I had a phenergan shot earlier and it helped me. The nursery brought Kara in and I sent them away. The pain was so bad I was shaking violently. I cried myself to sleep.

I really wanted to breastfeed Kara, since I was unable to do it for Jordana. Once again, the lactation consultant never showed up at the hospital. I knew I had a few days to decide. The first night we were home, Kara slept from 11pm to 5am. The second night, 12 pm to 6am. I have decided not to breastfeed because she is sleeping so well.. I know it is selfish, but Jordana kept me awake for 7 months. I was a zombie and had to take anti-depressants. I really don't want to go through that again!! Of course the minute I made that decision...my milk came in. Boy does it hurt.

Jordana seems to be taking it well. She stared hugging and kissing Kara right away. Whenever Kara cries, she says "it's ok baby". The only problem is there have been some incidents of un explainable crying. The past 2 nights, Jordana has become beligerent and when we try to sit down to dinner, she starts crying for no reason. Randy and I are at a loss. She refuses to listen to us, to the point where what she is doing might be dangerous (standing on kitchen chair) or completely disrespectful (yelling back at us). And when we confront her, she startes blubbering. It breaks my heart and I want to cry with her, but there is just no reason for it. We only hope it is because she is still suffering from strep and may be hurting. We have a birthday party tomorrow, so we'll see how she handles that.