Three years ago…

My due date with Molly had arrived.

But she had not.
I went to my 40 week appointment and was devastated when the doctors told me there was little progress (between 1 and 2 cm!) and that they’d let me go 10-12 days before an induction. While I didn’t want to go 10-12 more days, I didn’t want to be induced more. I cried, called my mom and my sister, and we did what any normal woman would do – we went shopping! Jim and I walked miles and miles that week, ate lots of Dairy Queen and watched more movies than I probably ever have in my entire life. {I’m pretty sure I told you guys this story already, but I enjoy retelling it. Obviously.}

I had four more doctor appointments before they finally said I had to have this baby and scheduled me for an induction. I needed to choose between August 6 or 7; my favorite doctor was on-call August 6, so I chose that day. It was so weird to know that the next day I was going to wake up, take a shower, and waltz into the hospital to have my baby. The last six weeks of my pregnancy, I was anticipating a dramatic water breaking event, or intense contractions stopping me in my tracks.

There was a dramatic water breaking event – just with something that resembled a knitting needle. And there were intense contractions and lots of vomiting that I endured for 8 hours before asking for an epidural that didn’t really relieve the pain. I don’t even know what words to use to describe that day, as we waited for the labor to progress. It was scary and calm and funny and sweet all at the same time.

Hours and hours later, we sent Jim to get something to eat. I was stalled at nine cm and remained there for three hours. The nurse kept checking the contractions and Molly’s heart rate {they had turned down the heart rate monitor at this point}; Dr. B came in while Jim was gone and hesitated, seeing that Jim wasn’t there. He said he was just checking in, which was weird, because they don’t do that. When Jim came back, the nurse and Dr. B came back in right away and told us I needed to have a c-section.

I wanted to brush my teeth, which I remember being a funny request. It feels like it was only minutes before I was wheeled to the operating room. I remember Dr. B making a joke about watching “Grey’s Anatomy” and being prepared for the surgery. It was almost time for him to go home, and I had a new nurse at this point. I threw up while strapped to the operating table, which is kind of hard to do, by the way. I remember so much about the surgery and recovery afterwards; it felt like forever before I could actually *hold* Molly and I know it was forever before I could sit up on my own!

Jim was so excited to introduce Molly to our parents and Beverly, all of whom had waited ALL day for Molly’s arrival.

While Molly’s birth story is not exactly what I had planned, she was perfect and healthy and lovely and I know in the end it doesn’t matter how she arrived in this world. It’s so crazy to think that it’s been almost three years since she was born.

And obviously it’s true that moms DO “forget” the pain of childbirth; I mean, I’m getting ready to do it again, right?

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Date night & gender reveal

Jim and I had another date night last night – two dates in four nights! So fun! I had planned for us to go to Barrington’s for dinner, knowing they would help me make the gender reveal a fun surprise that wasn’t overwhelming. Jim really wanted to know the gender but didn’t want to have a party or anything, and I didn’t want to know the gender, but am always up for a night out, so this was a good compromise. The ultrasound appointment was yesterday morning; the baby looks great! Then we picked Molly up from camp early, went to lunch uptown and then spent the afternoon at Discovery Place. It was such a FUN afternoon. When we got home, I had to run a quick errand for a customer and I swung by Barrington’s to drop off the gender results. The sous chef was excited to be part of the surprise! When we got in the car to head to dinner, Jim said he was a little anxious about the surprise I had planned, then he joked we should just go to Chick-fil-a. I told him if he wanted to know the gender of the baby, he better not stop at Chick-fil-a! After a lovely dinner, we ordered dessert (the cobbler is our absolute favorite!) and this is what was brought to the table:

Even though Jim and I both thought it was a boy, we just weren’t prepared for a boy! It was quiet for a minute while we processed the information and the staff at Barrington’s came over to congratulate us. And then we headed to the mall to find something for boy-ish for Baby G. Jim picked out the babe’s first pj’s – blue striped Hannah Andersson. We had to make ourselves look at the blue stuff since we are so used to picking out pink!

We told Molly this morning she was going to have a brother and her first response was, “No, it’s a girl.” But by lunchtime, she seemed to have accepted the fact it’s a baby brother and even circled the B’s on her word search at lunch in honor of baby brother. She’s going to be a fabulous big sister; I tear up just thinking about the amazing gift of a sibling!

Ok, so now that we’ve announced the gender, we have no idea about the nursery or the name or anything else, so hopefully this is enough information for now! And rest assured that any name Molly {or Jim, for that matter} gives you is NOT the name. We would be crazy to tell her; we might as well take out a full page ad in the Charlotte Observer!

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Make your pick – blue or pink?

Jim and I are going to the anatomy ultrasound this morning. Surprisingly, Jim is the one who wants to know the gender this time around. Both of us kind of think girl, although I’ve been leaning more toward boy recently. Molly is determined it’s a sister for her; she told me if it was a boy baby, she would just have a girl!

A lot of my friends also think it’s another girl, although one of my sisters thinks it’s a boy. What do you think? For full disclosure, I was as sick if not more so with this pregnancy as I was with Molly and I have had the same rash/reaction on my back that I had last time. I have not had a reaction to my rings yet, however, and last time I had a massive reaction on my left hand to my wedding rings.

Cast your vote below.

Jim and I are going out to dinner tonight and plan to find out then what the gender is, so no texts or phone calls this afternoon because we won’t know!

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