The Birth Story

Today Spencer is exactly 1 week and 5 days old. We are still marinating in the joy of becoming parents to this amazing little gift from above. Spencer’s Bris was on November 26th; he did great and is healing quite nicely. Honestly, we learned that the whole experience is probably tougher on the parents than it is on the baby. Spencer was named for one of the greatest men I ever knew, my daddy, Steven. He received the Hebrew name Shlomo Chaim; Shlomo was my father’s name and Chaim means ‘Life’ in Hebrew. For Spencer’s first Thanksgiving he was surrounded by family that couldn’t be happier to have him there. We were truly thankful for having him! This past Saturday we had our very first late night visit to the pediatrician; Spencer has/had conjunctivitis in his left eye which the doctor said could have come from anything. We’re treating both eyes right now, and it seems to be clearing up very well. Tomorrow we’re going back to the doctor for our 2 week old appointment; unfortunately he will be receiving his first shot. We’re not looking forward to it, but he’s been such a trooper at all of his other appointments we’re hoping he’ll keep up the same demeanor.

The birth story:

So, Josh and I went to our regular weekly appointment at 9 AM on 11/19, at this time I was 39 weeks. Since I hadn’t yet met with one of the mid-wives, I had my appointment with her…and I’m so glad that I had the chance to meet her. We had thought that we would be talking about a plan of what to do if I didn’t deliver the little guy by the 40th week. Keep in mind that everyone had told me that when I was in active labor, I would know it, so when the mid-wife was examining me, she mentioned that she thought “you should be delivering today”. Apparently, I was in labor and didn’t know it. The baby’s position had changed, but I was still only 3 cm dilated. So, at that point, I met with the doctor and she decided to send me over to labor & delivery to do some blood work, a sonogram, and plan to be induced that night at around 6 pm; the doctor said that I would either be delivering later that night or early the next morning. With that, she told Josh that he had plenty of time to take me to the hospital and then run home to change. Keep in mind that we had all the intentions to go straight to work from the doctor’s appointment, so he needed to get changed out of his shirt & tie whereas I was putting on a hospital gown. By the time I was put into a room, it was now around 1130 AM once I was settled in Josh left to go home and get changed (keep in mind that we live in Delray and I was delivering at CSMC) and he was comfortable doing this since the doctor said we had at least until 6 PM before things get started. At 1230 PM, the doctor who sent me over came in to give me a physical exam; from my physical exam that morning, I was already 4 cm dilated. At 1 PM, she then came in and broke my water, by 115 PM I was 7 cm dilated. At this point, my mother had just arrived and we told Josh to hurry back because this was going to happen WAY before 6 PM. At 300PM, I was feeling the contractions STRONGLY and solely in my back. At about 345PM I asked for the epidural; the anastiologist came at about 350PM and after making sure it was OK to have the epidural (due to the other meds I had taken that morning) she administrated it to me. Because I didn’t feel anything that she had done, she felt that it possibly hadn’t worked, so she gave me a small dose to check it out. When I didn’t feel the ‘coldness’ of the meds going in my back, she decided that it would be best to do it again. Well, in the middle of the 2nd epidural, the first one kicked in. So, by now, I was feeling REALLY good. The nurse came in to check me out at 440PM, and said that it was just about time to start pushing. The midwife, who I had just met that morning, arrived at about 450PM to deliver our son. At that point, we asked Josh’s parents to leave the room, so that it was just my mother, Josh, and I with the nurse & midwife. I did my first push at 500PM, and with the 2nd push out came our beautiful son at 511PM!

At this point, he still hadn’t had a name, so after they cleaned him up we asked my mother, my friend Dana, and Josh’s parents to leave the room so that we could discuss the name issue. The conversation went something like this:

Gena: OK, so now we have to decide on a name.
Josh: Well, what do you like best, Samuel or Spencer?
Gena: I like them both; does he have a curl in his hair, if he does it needs to be Samuel.
Josh: Nope, no curls. So, what do you like better for him?
Gena: I think I like Spencer, it’s less common then Samuel, but both are nice.
Josh: I like both as well.
Gena: OK, but what do you like best?
Josh: I think I like Spencer.
Gena: OK then, Spencer it is.

With that we introduced Spencer Alec born on November 19, 2008 weighing in at 6lb 15oz and 20in.

The wondful midwife who delivered Spencer!

Going home!

And now a preview of the newborn pics, courtesy of the wonderful Virginia Hartman (http://www.virginiahartman.com/):

And who could forgot our first born, Bunker: