Introducing: Brigham Michael

I'm finally posting some pics of Brigham. My sister got most the pics of the hospital experience, so I will post more of those when I get them from her. But for now, these are some cute pics from the first week of his life. He is a really good baby and we are so happy to have him in our home.
He was 9 lbs. 9.4 oz. & 21.5 in. long. And it was a typical "this is my fifth baby so it should be super easy....but then turns out to be your hardest yet" experience. I really wanted to try going without an epideral this time, just because I thought it would be neat to have that experience. And after the way Breanne, Eli, and Scott came, I knew that I could easily do it. But Brigham had other plans. First of all, I never went into labor on my own (which baffled me). And he was a big baby, so the longer we waited for me to go into labor on my own... the bigger he got. So I decided to go in for an induction on my "due date" (the 9th of Sept). I got to the hospital at 11:30, and was positive that I would have this baby before 5:00 that night. I got some pit, and was doing just fine (pain wise), got to a 4 1/2 and my doc broke my water.... thinking that this baby would slide right out like the rest of them.... but no..... I dialated to a 7 and my contractions got super hard!!!! Then after an hour, I was only an 8, and like a -2 station. He was just so far up there even with all the contractions. 2 miserable hours later...still an 8! But now he was finally low enough that the doc and the nurse thought he could be POSTERIOR! Which would explain why he was just coming right out like we had planned. By this time, I'm thinking that I need the epideral because this isn't going to over any time soon. I was grateful that my doctor made it my call, and was trying to respect my wishes to go naturally, but this was not what I had in mind when I said I wanted to go without the epideral. And thank heaven I was able to get the epideral within a couple more contractions, because I was dying. So then I got to "relax" a little and just let the contractions come for another 3 hours!!! Then I had to push for about 40 minutes to try to get him low enough that the doctor could finally go in with forcepts and turn him so I could push him out. He came at 12:11 a.m. so his birthday is the 10th of September. They had to suck fluid out of his lungs, but other than that, he is perfectly healthy! I was just grateful for the advancements in medicine that made what could have been a really bad situation into a non-life threatening one. I just don't know if I would have ever gone into labor on my own, or been able to push him out without the pain help. Maybe on the next one.... if I go into labor on my own, and it seems like everything is normal and healthy.... I will try again. I certainly know that I could do it (because I did it for more than 3 hours!) And then I will be able to see what the "afterwards" that everyone talks about feels like. We will see. But for now, just so grateful to get to bring home a healthy baby boy. I can hardly believe that he is our fifth! Time just flies. We are so grateful for all of our children! Life is good.























First bath (at home anyway).